The Pretender: A Naruto Fanfiction
by motherafrica
Summary: Naruto. Sakura. Shikamaru. Ino. Neji. Tenten. Stuck in this frozen wasteland stemming from a mission gone wrong. Then the Taka arrive. We're stuck altogether. We have not but ourselves. But he who is among us is a hidden imposter. Who can we trust? Friends. Enemies. No one...
1. Chapter 1:Hide and Seek

**Chapter 1: Hide and Seek**

**2:16 pm**

The white forest.

Dead with barren trees. Their branches resembled waifish children sticking out their long claw-like fingers at the white sky in desperation.

The young ninja sitting at the base of a tree opened her eyes. Her world was spinning. She rested her dizzy head on her propped up knees and squeezed her eyes shut tightly to calm the disorientation, trying to grasp what had happened. What had happened? Only a single terrified thought devastated her mind: Naruto.

Naruto. Her partner, best friend and admittedly her champion. Missing. Where was Naruto? The very idea of him being harmed by the encumbrance that was _Him_ made her freezing body tremble in anguish. The burdening guilt churning inside her yelled in fury that it was all her fault; she should've stopped him when she had the chance...but she couldn't. Now there was no turning back, what was done was done...she needed to find him. But how?

She lifted her head up. The situation was impossible; she thought staring blankly at nothingness with wide bloodshot eyes, mouth agape sitting on the snow. How would she rescue Naruto from him..._him_.

She had seen _him_ again. _Him_ again. With odd-looking strangers, including a girl with cherry red hair. Who was she? Not his girlfriend!...well it didn't matter now anyway. He was now that painful word. Enemy. She wasn't allowed to care about him anymore. She clutched the straps of her backpack tighter. The dirt and melting ice in her hair clung onto every dishevelled strand of blush pink on her head. The white forest and its loneliness.

Alone. She was alone.

She didn't want to be.

She blindly stood up from the base of a tree in the snow-covered forest and started running...

She was running, scared...

She looked around and around...

Naruto, Naruto, where was Naruto, where was everyone else as well...left, right everywhere...

The blaring and giant blast that had scattered and sent all eleven of them flying into the air had happened mere minutes ago yet an eerie silence had taken its place.

She listened to the whistling wind trying to hear something, anything at all, but the deafening, still silence pressing on her ears polluted her mind with fears. Breathing harder, she listened to her loud heartbeat. Finally, a sound, preventing herself from sinking into insanity.

The sharp breathing of the pastel-pink haired kunoichi broke the silence of the snow smothered forest, deep in nowhere. Her panting echoed through the white nothingness she saw in front of her. It was not but trees, white and her breath coming out in cold gasps escaping her mouth. She was running.

She ran around searching for any signs of life for what felt like forever until she couldn't go anymore. The freezing air was stabbing her lungs and exhausting all her senses. The cold slowly gripping on her exposed face. She finally stopped running to lean on a nearby tree for support and tried to catch her breath. It was a nightmare. A nightmare of a mission gone horribly wrong…

"NARUTO? SHIKAMARU? ANYONE?..." she cried in a desperate echo bouncing back to her.

Nothing.

It had been like that for a while now.

Sakura sat down again in near hopelessness on the body numbing snow at the base of another tree and tried to gather her thoughts. The last thing she remembered was arriving at the abandoned snow laden forest earlier that day with the other five Leaf ninja, six with herself included, on a mission to assassinate a rogue ninja. Luckily they'd prepared for the harsh winter on the outskirts of Kusagakure: The Grass Village, deep in the countryside but were unprepared for something else. The massive forest. The forest was so vast and thick that any hopes of finding the rogue in one day were diminished. But then they'd collided with another unexpected problem they'd not seen coming. Complications. Confusion and shock. The Taka….

They'd tracked the rogue ninja to the forest but unexpectedly ran into a group of wanted vagabond 'terrorists'. The Taka. Headed by _him_. The stranger they'd all grown up knowing, with the blue-black hair, broody mannerisms and the red-and-white fan crest emblazoned on the back of his clothing. That's when everything happened…

The meltdown of Naruto. The confrontation with the Leaf ninja and the Taka. Then the one big guy from the Taka, he'd gone crazy. Afterwards the giant blast, probably from the unseen rogue ninja himself scattered them all like origami paper in the wind…then nothing…

Her comrades. Naruto, team Captain Shikamaru, Ino, second-in-command Neji and Tenten were all missing from her team. Now, she was completely alone in a frozen forest not knowing how to get out and most frightfully, with a formidable rogue ninja still on the loose, not to mention the most unpredictable Taka themselves…The Taka.

But _him_. Dare she say the unspeakable name..._Sasuke_, seeing his face again since their last disastrous encounter at Orochimaru's hideout, for her was unbelievable…Naruto...

Naruto, what happened to Naruto, she had to find him before Sasuke and his gang did. She would never allow Sasuke to hurt him…Naruto. The panic of desperately needing to find Naruto pulled her heavy freezing body back up.

She kicked out her legs, trying to get some feeling back into them to carry her deeper into the woods, into the unknown. Naruto, where was he? No shinobi had ever heard of giving up no matter how complicated their mission became and she wouldn't be the first one to start. Feeling slightly calmer than when she was running, she pulled herself through the cold, clutching her thick jacket for comfort; at least they had been prepared for the cold. At least. She continued searching...

-BANG-

Sakura jolted around and let out a tiny scream in startle, scanning the surrounding area when she'd heard the loud indistinctive bang ricochet through the choking silence and sharp howling wind from somewhere else in the forest. Her heart began to beat furiously against her chest. Nothing came.

Until a shrill high-pitched scream came attacking at her like a thousand knives, piercing and stabbing the frozen air. She let out a gasp of pain as the scream assaulted her ears so she covered them...When it appeared to be safe, she let go of her ears. It was quiet for only a second, then…

"-_h, h…hide and seek, hide and seek, k, k…-"_

A high-pitched whisper echoed towards her from every corner of the white forest. Sakura felt the hairs on her back move steadily and uncomfortably down her spine to stiffen her body.

Her eyes darted swiftly from corner to corner, left and right. The voice had come from nowhere…It was gone.

The second that the mystical voice vanished, Sakura felt the warm treacle of a thick liquid sliding slowly down her nose...her intuition told her that it was probably what she predicted in her mind...She wiped her nose and gasped at seeing blood smeared onto her hand. Her suspicions were correct. Her nose was bleeding. But it appeared that it was only the one red trail as it seemed to vanish...the nosebleed came and left. Just like the whispering voice...was it possible that she'd imagined the voice...

She strained her ears: there was no denying that a voice had just echoed and swiveled past her in blurred echoed speech; saying something about...hide and seek…there was nothing in her mind to explain what it could've possibly been. She frantically looked around to find where the noise could've come from but nothing came. Nothing from nowhere. She needed to get out of the forest and quickly. The trees began to move and shake as paranoid fear engulfed all logic. She was alone in the forest, hearing voices.

She was running scared.

**2:31 pm**

Finally as the trees began to thin out and the snow slowly starting to gently fall again, she narrowed her eyes to see…something…wait, she saw something. A flash of blackish-brown in the gaps between the white trees against a white backdrop. If she had even blinked, she would have missed it completely.

Was that...could it be...she peered into the distance and saw the silhouette of what looked like a house. A glimmer of hope sparked inside her as she rushed and trudged forward in ankle-deep snow to take a closer look and saw it clearly: a somewhat large-scale traditional Japanese house complete with a wooden patio and chimney. She stared at it in disbelief; a lone quiet home sitting proud and boastful about its magnificent architecture yet so snug and still in the cold as if waiting patiently to be stumbled upon. In the middle of nowheresville centuries outside The Village Hidden in the Grass. But with her pink nose running and her mouth blueing, she realised gratefully that she'd finally found shelter.

She ran as fast as her heavy frozen feet could carry her amidst the trickle of cotton balls falling from the white sky to the very inviting looking house as if it would disappear if she didn't get there quick enough. But something stopped her in her tracks halfway there; an unsettling thought crept into her mind…as quiet and eerie as the house stood, that didn't guarantee it was empty inside. It could be a trap…But she would have to take it, finding her friends and finishing the mission was crucial. But what about _his_ team..._Sasuke_. She didn't know what to think.

As she arrived at the house, stepping closer to the stairs leading up to the patio, she noticed that a candle inside a lantern mounted on the outside wall acting as a porch light still had smoke emitting out from it… someone had been here recently. It made her curious; the house appeared to be quite...still and quiet in an eerie sort of way with its dark wood and closed up doors and panels as if its main aim was to keep everyone out. She braced herself for what could be waiting for her on the other side of the front door. She focused her chakra in her fist-

"…maru?..."

She stopped.

The faint voice echoed from a near distance behind her and made her stop in startle. Sakura quickly whipped around. Someone was calling out from behind the trees in the nearby forest she'd just come out of. As desperate as she was to get out of the cold at least for a while, she knew that the voice could be her only chance to find anyone, be it the Taka or Leaf team...or the rogue. She gave the house one last glance with a sinking feeling and a final shiver rolling through her body before running the other way to try and find the voice.

She ran back into the dense forested trees and looked around for any signs of someone. She decided not to call out in case it was a trap of some sorts and inspected around…until, someone's shadow was visible at a nearby tree, walking in her direction. The figure was getting closer. Sakura could feel her heart beating furiously against her chest as she prepared herself for the worst-the rogue ninja, Sasuke's teammates-she would have to face the enemy alone. Her knuckles turned a bright blue as she built up and focused her chakra in her knuckles for when or if she needed to strike a deadly blow at someone; strength was her speciality after all. She remained hidden behind a tree and waited for the figure to come closer. The figure didn't know that she was there so she at least had the advantage of a surprise attack.

"Hello?" the voice called out in a shivery echo.

Sakura stopped to think for a second; something about that voice sounded familiar and female. She stared at the person looking around helplessly in the snow who finally came close enough to the tree for her to see who it was. It was a teenage girl with ridiculously long blonde hair tied in a high ponytail and waterfall fringe over one side of her face in Leaf ninja uniform covered by a thick jacket like her own except it was purple instead of magenta pink.

Ino.

Blonde and blue-eyed sassy and gorgeous yet shivering Ino Yamanaka was finally in her sight.

Finally it came. That feeling she'd been waiting for. She was no longer alone. Relief washed over her body as Sakura realised that she had found at least one of her Leaf shinobi comrades even if it was only one person and not her own teammate, it was a start…

"Ino?" she yelled walking cautiously towards her from behind the tree where she hid.

"Sakura? Is that you? Oh my goodness! Sakura!" beamed Ino turning around to see her old friend.

Sakura rushed up to Ino in the thick snow and both girls embraced each other with a tight hug forgetting that they weren't as close as they used to be.

"Are you okay?" asked Sakura letting out a soft cry.

"Yes, I'm fine" Ino breathed shaking her head also relieved. They both pulled away and glanced at each other realising what they had just done. Sakura remembered that they were more like rivals or frenemies now, yet she couldn't help but feel genuine excitement at seeing her former best friend. They quickly jumped into pressing matters to ease the awkwardness.

"What happened? Where is everyone else, did they get hurt by the Taka or the rogue?" Sakura asked looking at Ino...

...The relieved smile was wiped off Ino's face; Sakura noticed it immediately and stared curiously at the blonde kunoichi...

"I don't know what you're talking about…" she said robotically in monotone as Ino noticed Sakura frowning at her.

Sakura examined Ino up and down. She was clutching her right hand into a tight fist…her fist was dripping with blood…

"Ino, your arm's bleeding! What happened to your arm?" she yelled anxiously over the howling wind.

Ino didn't respond. Instead her nostrils flared and she glared at Sakura unblinking from the top of her narrowed eyes, eyebrows drawn together. It was the same stare down any savage wild predator would eye at its prey before devouring it. Sakura's pale green eyes swiftly darted from Ino's vicious facial expression back to her bleeding hand. Why did everything change so suddenly...?

"Ino? What's wrong with you?" she whispered feeling guarded. Ino licked her lips slowly...Sakura's eyes grew wider. There was an awkward frightened pause before Sakura knew that something was about to go down.

Ino lifted her bloodied fist at her as she involuntarily stepped back ominously...then...

In an instant Ino threw a dozen shuriken at her from both hands. Her hands were so fast that they were hardly visible to the naked eye...her speed was incredible...All the shuriken were coming at Sakura within one split second of each other; Sakura had no time to think, she bolted behind the nearest tree for coverage...but Ino was already there. Such was unnatural speed. She kept firing relentlessly at Sakura spinning around and rotating like a spinning top, sending a shuriken shower flying all over the forest at life threatening speeds while Sakura ducked and dodged them all. She'd been in a similar experience once but with Lady Chiyo had been there to help control her speed.

She jumped upwards into the tree to avoid the dangerously sharp weapons and the crazy Ino. The second her foot touched down onto the tree branch Ino was almost above her, shooting straight up like a missile and firing more shuriken at her. Sakura screamed; she couldn't keep up with her amazing speed. One, Two, three, four, five, six...all six shuriken pinned her hair and clothing to the tree as she struggled to get free. Ino landed on the tree and stalked towards her with the same evil look on her face, a bloodthirsty monster.

"Ino! It's me, Sakura...Why are you attacking me?" she yelled struggling to get free as Ino spat to the ground and flared her nostrils not saying a word.

She was getting closer and closer; Sakura tried and struggled...until Ino threw another shuriken at her. She closed her eyes in fear. It grazed her arm as it whizzed past her and sliced through the tree above her head. Sakura stood stunned when the top of the tree began to topple. The shuriken...she was able to slice through the thick tree with a mere small-sized shuriken. Impossible... Sakura stared at Ino. She was made into a killer. The tree began falling sideways as Sakura dislodged her arm free just in time to unpin the shuriken out of the falling tree to throw them at Ino and jump down...away. Ino flipped upwards over the shuriken to avoid them, whipping her long blonde hair in the cold air and launched herself forward and out of the tree towards Sakura.

Ino was gaining on her. It was now or never Sakura knew. She stopped running and waited for impact...staring Ino straight in her twisted face...Ino bared her teeth at her when she was a second from Sakura, as Sakura curled her own fist into a ball ready to swing...She swung her fist directly at Ino's face but Ino caught her fist and PLOUGHED into her. Both Kunoichi crashed with a loud thud, grinding and skiing onto the snow-covered ground. Sakura could feel the pain in her body at impact; Ino felt like a bullet hitting her.

She lay on the ground numb, but Ino was already getting up so she tripped her feet and Ino fell forward almost on top of her but this time Sakura grabbed her long ponytail to ram her down to the ground again and sat on top of her. The back of her mind told her that she couldn't hurt Ino but there was nothing she could do. She was under attack. She clenched her fist again above Ino's face... she only needed a second...

Sakura was about to strike when she saw the change flash in Ino's now softened bright blue eyes...it happened in an instant. Ino gasped in startle and emitted a fear filled yell, curling up and placing her hands over her face for protection from the impact.

"Sakura!"

Sakura stopped her fist hovering in mid-air just above Ino's beautiful face. One second more and the blonde kunoichi would've been underground.

Ino's whole body was trembling as she gazed up at her old rival. The look in her eyes like a scared rabbit told Sakura that it was over. She was somehow back to normal.

"What...what are you doing?" she cried breathing heavily with her chest rising and falling rapidly. She felt vulnerable being at the mercy of Sakura's well-known strength.

"What do you mean what am I doing? What are you doing attacking me?"

Ino tried to catch her breath allowing Sakura's words to sink in. Somehow her puzzled face was very disturbing to Sakura after what had just happened.

"Attacking you? I never attacked you. I just opened my eyes now and found you on top of me about to knock me into oblivion! I never attacked you Sakura!" she yelled outraged.

Her words vibrated inside Sakura's mind. The look on her face told it to her, she was being genuine. She somehow had no recollection of what just happened.

"What? Then what just happened..." asked Sakura stunned.

"I don't know...you're saying that I just attacked you? Out of the blue? Do you think maybe you were hallucinating or you were under a genjutsu?"

"I can't tell. But Ino...you were amazing. You're speed was incredible, like you were a robot or something shooting shuriken at me...are you okay?" she asked as they helped each other up.

"Well Sakura, I don't really know how to say this but...I think I felt something in my head" she massaged her head frantically.

"You did? I knew it...do you think maybe you were being controlled?"

"How? We're the only ones in this area right now" said Ino checking herself from top to bottom. That's when she noticed her bloodied hand and freaked out.

"My arm! What happened to my arm?" she freaked while looking frantically for any wound.

"That's what I asked you but instead you attacked me" said Sakura helping Ino find the source of the blood.

"There's...there's no wound" she said shocked and staring up at Sakura who couldn't understand it.

"Then where did this blood come from? Sakura what's going on here? First I could swear that I felt something in my head and now this."

"Well it's not my blood. There was blood on your fist before you attacked me...listen Ino, I was wondering whether you happened to hear a voice in the forest? A high-pitched scream followed by a voice?"

"No, why? Is that what you heard? Is that what did this to me?" said Ino. Sakura wished she had an answer to calm Ino down, she looked very uneasy. Sakura looked out to the quiet windy forest.

"Maybe when we find the others, all of this will make sense"

"So how will we find them, remember we have to find the others before _he_ gets to them." Ino said anxiously remembering who their assailant was.

Sakura couldn't tell whether she was talking about the rogue ninja or the 'enemies' known as the Taka. But Ino was starting to shiver even with her thick purple jacket, Sakura had no idea what their next move should be as the snow started to beat down ever harder against the increasingly hostile wind picking up. She decided that it was best to get to the shelter first.

"Listen Ino, I think we'll have to get out of the cold first-

-SNAP-

The breaking of branches and crunching leaves on the snow-covered ground came from near them.

"Ouch!" someone whined.

Ino and Sakura involuntarily jumped and held onto each other without noticing this time for a second, and then their weapons were at the ready in defensive stances. They both stared in the direction that the noise had come from; it sounded like someone from the row of trees nearest them. Sakura could feel Ino's hands shaking against her own hands as they waited for the voice to reveal itself. It made her start to shake as well for some reason. They waited with frozen bated breath for this someone to come out…

Tenten came out of the trees carrying her long bow staff she had just used to knock down branches in her way. Sakura and Ino hid away their weapons and smiled up at the sight of Tenten looking confused and cold from the ever stronger wind and falling snow, her signature two-sided Chinese bun hairstyle now hanging in her face.

"Hey Ino, Sakura, I found you. Thank goodness." she said happily but sounded exhausted.

"Tenten, are you okay? What happened to you?" asked Sakura.

"I only remember waking up by myself in this forest then I went around looking for Ne—I mean everyone else until I found you guys now. And you two?"

"We only just found each other now as well but it's pretty much the same story. Except... something weird just happened..." said Ino trying to keep her long fringe from blowing in her face.

"Really, like what?"

The two medical ninja exchanged glances at each other not knowing how to go about explaining the attack, voices and disturbances to her. "Never mind, it's a long story and we need time to explain it" said Sakura feeling wary.

"So then... is anyone else found yet?" asked Tenten with someone in mind.

"Afraid not, that includes the rogue ninja and-

"-And Sasuke who still looks as dreamy as ever in his new outfit. Did you see how low his shirt unzips, when that black cloak blew away from his body, even in this cold!" came Ino randomly. Sakura and Tenten shook their heads at each other in disbelief.

"You're such an airhead Ino, how could you say that at a time like this. Not to mention that he's our… erm, not our ally or comrade!" snapped Sakura unable to say the 'word'. Enemy.

"Do you honestly believe that Sakura, do you see him as an enemy and not former member of team Kakashi, I mean team seven?" asked Tenten serious faced hair blowing in the wind...

Sakura couldn't answer; the situation with Sasuke was far too complicated for that kind of simple answer...

**2:05 pm**

The white forest. Only decades away, the only Jonin on the Leaf ninja team felt his head throb achingly against the sharp wind. Neji Hyuuga was annoyed and edgy. After waking up alone with a blistering headache, he breathed furiously to calm himself down and dug his fingers into his glorious hair to soothe the pain at the back of his skull caused when he'd hit his head on the tree during the blast that'd knocked him out. Strangely enough to him, there was no bruise or bump forming at the back of his head, only moisture from the melting snow on his hair. But that was not important to him now, as he was still in the eerie forest alone and needed to find his Leaf ninja allies and eliminate any enemy he came across-any. He trudged about the snow using his byakugan to scan the area but saw nothing...until he turned to a clearing behind a tree and spotted something or someone. He noticed the silhouette and chakra network of someone standing out in the open. Strangely, standing completely still. A girl, he saw when she turned around, had pale green eyes. Sakura. He let out an eased sigh and cautiously approached her.

"Sakura, is that you?" he asked coming out to meet her grateful that he'd found a Leaf comrade even if it wasn't 'the one' he'd hoped to find.

"Oh Neji, hi. There you are. Are you okay?" she asked frolicking straight up to him and squeezing him with a tight hug, she then looked up at him with shining eyes. There was only a slight moment's hesitation as Neji didn't realise at first what she'd done. After the initial shock he was somehow able to awkwardly worm his way out of her tight embrace and stared at her in disbelief, completely taken aback.

"What on earth do you think you're doing?" he demanded staring at her wide-eyed and stiff; she could've just set herself on fire.

"I'm just happy to see that you're okay, that's all" Sakura said innocently looking up at his head. Neji furrowed his brows and looked away, clearing his throat.

"Yes well, there's no time for that now. We still need to locate the others. Have you found anyone else yet?" he asked keeping a slight distance from her and never returning her gaze.

"Nope. It's just me. I like your hair by the way, it's real pretty." she said smiling happily as if she didn't have a care in the world. His mind went numb; he hadn't recovered from the initial shock of her previous actions and now she was acting more bizarre. He didn't know what to do but stare. What on earth was wrong with her?

Looking closer at her he noticed her...she was...she was touching herself all over her body, spinning around in her thick jacket, gazing, checking out her long legs which made her smile, flipping her soft pink chin length hair, and she seemed fascinated by herself...all he could do was watch her blankly.

All his observations were interrupted by the sudden wooziness and dizziness that overpowered his senses as his head began hurting again so he closed his eyes for a moment to focus again. It didn't help.

He let out a sigh of pain; his headache was getting worse.

"Sakura, we have to find the others-

-Want to play a game? Maybe hide and seek?" she beamed at him out of the blue with a dazzling smile.

"What is the matter with you, were on a mission..." he said annoyed at her made worse by his pained head. He had no time for her to fool around; the current situation was already precarious without her childish abandon.

"Ah! No one ever wants to play that game with me. Fine! Let's just go" she pouted in a two-year old type tantrum taking is hand and pulling him along with her.

"Wait, what are you doing? Let go of me" he said looking down at her hands in his with one eye open as pain continued to hurt his head. Sakura was starting to get on his nerves now.

"So we can be safe and we don't lose each other" she said with a smile staring up at his head intently.

"No thank you" he said pulling his arm free. The girl next to him couldn't be Sakura, something was wrong with her...she was too bizarre.

Neji continued to keep his distance from her as he and Sakura both walked about the forest before he saw with his byakugan the silhouette of someone lying down on the snow near a tree, unconscious he saw, and a few metres from them.

"Wait, I see something over there. Let's go." hissed Neji hurriedly making his way to the tree.

"Uh-uh. Before we go there, I have to say, I gotta go" Sakura said suddenly shaking her head at him.

"Excuse me?"

"I need to use the bathroom. Right now, it can't wait. I'll just have to squat behind a tree somewhere."

An awkward pause fell upon them. Before he could express his annoyance at yet another one of her hindrances, Sakura was already jogging away from him.

"Wait, Sakura-

"Don't look you perve." Sakura scolded at him. He had no choice but to look away, growling under his breath in frustration.

"You really should've played with me. I would've been fun." she shouted back to him skipping merrily to a few trees away from him. She was gone before he could say anything more...

**2:14 pm**

Neji waited...and waited...and waited. Sakura never came back. It had been far too long now...he decided it had to be safe to go and investigate. He walked over to the trees where he'd seen her go to. Absent...

"Sakura? Sakura?" he hissed out angrily at her.

Nothing.

He turned on his byakugan. His head began to throb dangerously, he just needed to do it quickly... he scanned the area but she really wasn't there. Something about her childish antics made him unsurprised by her disappearance. She had been really strange. She was actually gone. He turned around with his byakugan still on. The silhouette of the unconscious person lying at the tree had vanished as well... He shook his head at the madness...

He really couldn't understand how she was able to completely vanish like that and why. Sakura had behaved very peculiar for some reason. He contemplated that maybe she might've been taken by someone, but he hadn't heard any struggle and he would've seen the chakra network if someone had arrived and abducted her. Then again, he remembered that he'd been forced to look away from her location on account that she'd requested privacy…Strange. Very strange.

A bolt of pain shot through his head. He gasped out in pain again and relaxed his byakugan.

His head felt like it was on the verge of exploding from pain. Desperation to find someone made him cling onto consciousness as he was near collapse.

He carried on searching...

**2:57 pm**

Light headed...how was it that his head could feel so light yet was so heavy to carry...Neji stomped about the snow looking for someone, anyone. Ninja life was extremely unpleasant at times.

"Sakura? Sakura!"

He'd yelled louder in frustration, it made his head hurt more. How long had he been looking for her now? It was ridiculous and unexplainable. He had no choice but to abandon his search for her.

Fortunately, this time he'd heard his own name coming at him in an echo.

"Neji?..."

It was distant but at least he could hear it.

"Byakugan"

His head continued to burn but the tiny hope of hearing someone calling out to him was all the hope he needed. Neji scanned the area; he saw with his byakugan three silhouettes of blue chakra a short way ahead of him, they were calling out to him and waving around their arms to get his attention. He followed the figures and then hid behind a tree before hearing familiar murmurings.

Neji stepped out of the trees and saw the three kunoichi of the Leaf team. Finally he saw her. The one he'd really been looking for all along. Tenten. Safe. He didn't care about anything else. His eyes shifted to see Ino then Sakura standing in the group and shot an irritated gaze at her.

"There you are. Are you three all alright?"

"Neji! Ah finally!" sang Tenten treading up to her teammate in the deep snow and biting wind. Something inside of her told her that she was happiest to see him specifically...Until she noticed something unnerving... Neji, he wasn't okay...

She stopped a few seconds away from him, wide-eyed. All three of the Leaf kunoichi did. When Neji noticed their faces, it alarmed him.

Neji especially noticed Tenten's overjoyed face replaced by horror as they all stared up at him stunned, and mouths agape.

"What's the matter?" he whispered terrified.

Tenten pointed at his head. She let out a horrified pained scream that sent the black birds of the white forested area flying off…

It petrified him, rooted him on the frozen ground.

Tenten, Ino and Sakura, nothing could explain the horror they felt staring at the large kunai sticking out from the back of Neji's head.

"NEJI!" Tenten screamed.

He couldn't respond, his mouth was glued shut in terror at her scream. Her scream...Tenten. He had no idea why they looked at him like he was about to die...

"You, you have a kunai sticking out the back of your head" she yelled pointing stunned at him.

He froze. Only shock and fear were able to move his arm. Neji's unnerved shaky hand shot up to feel the back of his head. He felt the cold metal of a giant knife lodged in his head. No wonder the headaches...It was stupefying... How? When? It hadn't been there when he touched his head earlier; he'd only felt moisture from the snow melting on his head. It dawned on him that the moisture he felt must've been his own blood. But he hadn't seen any blood on his hands...he brought his hand back down and looked at the evidence. Blood...Light-headedness overwhelmed and collapsed his body to his knees.

"Neji! Sakura, Ino, We have to help him." Tenten flew to his side as the two medical ninja followed behind her. She caught him before the rest of his body hit the ground and hastily aimed to dislodge the weapon from the back of his head.

"WAIT!" yelled Sakura in the loud rushing wind. Tenten and Ino both stopped. Sakura could see Tenten was shaking violently and not from the wind.

"Don't just pull it out of him; he'll lose a lot more blood that way. This kunai is now acting as a plug when left in, keeping his blood from pouring out."

"So what do we do? We can't just leave it in his head like this" cried Tenten visibly shaken.

"Ino, help me here. Focus your chakra on the point of penetration to pull the kunai out and heal his wound at the same time so no more blood is lost. Do it slowly, we don't know how deep it is inside his head. We don't want to rupture anything." she said to the other medical ninja. Nothing in the world could've prepared her to perform medical ninjutsu under such stressful conditions.

Tenten held him upright as Neji's eyes began to flicker open.

"Don't worry Neji, you'll be fine" she said looking him straight in the eyes as he exclaimed in pain. He stared into her concerned soft brown eyes feeling every one of her emotions in himself, so close. His death was too close for comfort...for the both of them.

**3:12 pm**

Sakura and Ino withdrew the kunai knife from Neji's now sealed wound and he could already feel the alleviation of pain from his head. Sakura combed his long hair over the wound to keep it from exposure.

"Thank you, both of you" he said quietly to the two medical kunoichi. They nodded to him as his safety as their comrade was all the gratitude they needed.

"Are you okay Neji? How did this happen to you? And how did you not feel anything?" asked Tenten on the verge of tears.

"I have no idea. I woke up with a headache but I didn't feel anything in my head when I touched it earlier. How is it that I didn't feel something as large and dramatic as this in my head?"

"Perhaps someone threw it at you right now, before we saw you?"

"No, I would've felt the impact..." he drifted away when his mind backtracked to when he'd woken up from the blast. Sakura. He'd just remembered that he was with her and would later look for her.

"Hold on, Sakura, you were with me! Why didn't you tell me there was a kunai thrown in my head? And where did you disappear to?" he lambasted at her.

She furrowed her brows, throwing a 'who me' look at him. "What are you talking about? I never saw you until you got here with us now" she said nodding at both Ino and Tenten for confirmation.

He stared at her in disbelief. It was impossible.

"It can't be! Sakura I was with you just now trying to find the others when you said that you needed the loo and you disappeared. You were acting very...peculiar"

"Neji. I didn't do any of those things" she said serious faced and shaking her head slowly at him.

He should've known it wasn't rightfully her. The way in which she was behaving...but he was very sure that it had been her. He knew better than to believe that he'd been delirious due to his then unknown injury.

"Guess it was your turn to forget something you did Sakura" said Ino remembering what'd happened to her when she met up with Sakura earlier. They both exchanged uneasy glances. Sakura didn't want to acknowledge that something unexplainable had happened to them that day...It was too terrifying...

"Neji, you need to rest" came Tenten still clutching his shoulders and standing in front of him.

"No, I'm fine now. It's alright Tenten. Let's get back to the task at hand-our mission. That's our top priority now." he said steadying himself up amidst the heavy snow and battering wind. He could feel Tenten's unyielding concerned gaze stabbing him, but he had to ignore it.

"None of us have seen even a single sign of the rogue or Taka" whined Ino starting to shiver against the wind and snowfall.

"I also searched the entire area and, with this ever-increasing snowfall going on, we cannot do any more searching around. It appears that we are alone, for now." he said solemnly.

Sakura tightened her gloved fists. As relieved as she was that Neji, Tenten and Ino were found, her mind kept reminding her that her own teammate along with Shikamaru hadn't returned yet. Naruto. Where was he? It was starting to stir up a panic inside of her as she watched the strong wind beating the snow down hard on and around them. If they didn't make it to a shelter soon, they could freeze to death or get targeted by the many enemies around. Looking around at the rest of the group, she knew they were also thinking the same thing. Ino, she guessed, was especially was thinking about Shikamaru whilst Neji and Tenten looked quite satisfied to see each other now healthy and safe. She was so jealous of the feeling. She couldn't wait to feel it herself...Naruto.

"Guys, listen up. Earlier on I found a hous-"

The noise of branches breaking interrupted Sakura and made them all tense up. It sounded like it came from right above them. All their heads shot up to look at who or what was in the tree, weapons drawn and a sharp noses out to sniff out any enemy.

A figure jumped down and stood in the shadow of the tree in the weak sunlight, waiting...Ino was too hasty...she thought that she'd recognised the silhouette of the person. He was hiding...lurking...

"Shikamaru!" she exclaimed excitedly stepping to the forefront of the Leaf ninja group in front of Sakura and Neji, elated that she'd finally found her previously Team Ten teammate.

"Wait!"

Neji stopped her from walking forward with his arm outstretched; looking very alertly at the figure by the tree, straining his byakugan eyes. One look at his intense eyes wiped the elation off Ino's face; clearly it wasn't who she'd hoped for.

"What? What is it Neji?" she whispered staring intensely at him. He didn't respond but kept his byakugan eyes fixated at the tree. She waited...who was it...

A teenage girl who didn't appear to be a day older or younger than the three Leaf Village Kunoichi stepped out of the darkness with a mean scowl on her face, her pretty eyes hidden by brown framed glasses. She was wearing the famously distinct black Akatsuki cloak with the red cloud print that matched her fiery cherry red hair. Judging by the look on her face, she was not as surprised and alerted to run into them as they were. Sakura recognised her as the only girl on the Taka team from the confrontation earlier who'd stayed out of the way of the others trying to find a way out for her team. They didn't get the chance to find out how strong she was yet. All eyes of the Leaf team were on her now.

"Leaf Ninja! Thought I'd smelled foul chakra. Disgusting!" she spat.

"Where's Shikamaru? What have you done with him!" yelled Ino who tried to step forward wielding a kunai at the ready but was held back by Neji.

"I have no idea what you're talking about. Where's Sasuke?" she sassed placing her hand on her hip and sticking out her leg.

"Sasuke?" asked Sakura standing behind Ino.

"_Yes, village girl_" she sneered with an overbearing attitude. "I take it you at least know Sasuke since he was previously in your little-

"Shut your damn mouth!" snarled Sakura stepping forward and giving the red-head girl a dirty look up and down. "How dare _you_ talk to us about Sasuke like you know him?"

"Sakura calm down" said Neji never taking his eyes off the stranger.

"So I take it that you did know him-_once_. Well I didn't come here to pick a fight with you Leaf ninja; I'm just looking for my own teammates just like you. You know _Sasuke_ on my team now..."

"Well we can't just allow you to walk away freely. You Taka are wanted ninja in every one of the Great Hidden Villages because of your affiliations with the Akatsuki." said Neji.

"The Akatsuki huh...funny...hmmm" she smirked deviously at them for some unknown reason. "Well it doesn't matter anyway. There's a snowstorm coming. You can't take me anywhere for arrest because there's nowhere to go. We're all going to die here. Well, except for Sasuke (Sakura clenched her fist when she said the unmentionable name) who is probably long gone now." she said smugly.

"Not quite. I know somewhere where we Leaf ninja will be kept safe. But that doesn't mean…" came Sakura.

The Leaf ninja exchanged glances and all nodded to each other. Then. With one swift movement Tenten launched forward and grabbed both the Taka girl's arms with her one hand, twisting them up behind her back and wired her entire body bound before the girl could blink and let out an exclaim of annoyance. Tenten then placed a kunai under her chin.

"Good work Tenten. At least that's one of them out of the way."

"Thanks Neji" she said appreciatively to him, flashing a smile at him which caught him off guard.

"Seriously, this is the same as doing nothing. What will kidnapping me do? Sasuke and the rest of the Taka are long gone. Like I said, we're all going to die there." said the Taka girl. The Leaf ignored her comment.

"Wait, so why are we capturing her if her team is gone and they won't come looking for her. She's no use to us as bait if we want to find the Taka" said Ino.

"Well we can't just allow her to go freely; she's one of our enemies. Well take her just to be cautious" said Neji.

"Don't forget guys, we still need to look for Shikamaru and Naruto" came a concerned Sakura.

"The storm is worsening; pretty soon we won't be able to cope out here." said Neji examining their wind and snow whipped surroundings.

"Don't worry about that, as I was going to say, I found a house outside the forest where we can hopefully take shelter and keep this girl there until we find Shikamaru and Naruto." said Sakura.

"Fantastic Sakura, take us there"

**3:24pm**

They all made their way through the forest. Sakura led them through the forest to where she remembered the house's location with their female captive not even struggling as she went along with Tenten. They walked with ever more difficulty against the howling wind and snowfall but finally as they exited the dense forest, the dark lonely yet majestic house was finally in sight. It made them feel slightly better to finally be a near distance away to marvel at the shelter they needed so desperately...but without their two comrades. Then the girl spoke.

"Ah finally, he's come, even if it's with the other two, but still. He's come to rescue me, how romantic!" she chimed dreamily which made the whole group stop a mere short distance away from the last row of trees before the clearing to the house...

"Could someone shut her up?" said Sakura annoyed.

"Wait a second" Ino said looking at Sakura who looked back at her. They both felt something...

"SCATTER!"

Sakura and Neji jumped backwards while Ino and Tenten still holding onto their female prisoner jumped sideways just in time to avoid the giant fist that pounded the ground they had just been not even a second ago. The Leaf ninja had almost detected it too late; three other people had landed with a crashing thud onto the soft snow-covered ground. The Leaf ninja group backed up slightly to face the new group of people.

"There you are Kariin, caught up with the enemy have you" came someone's light-hearted mocking.

The collective gasp of Leaf ninja in surprise at the sight of the rest of the Taka showed their frustration...The Taka. With _him_ as Sakura saw. Sasuke, standing forward and confident, flanked by the two other Taka ninja. Sakura tried not to look at him; it stirred unwelcome and confusing emotions inside her. The one who had said the silly snide comment had chin length whitish-blue hair and a shark like incisor tooth peeping out the top lip of his smug, toothy grin. Sakura noticed that he had a giant blade strapped to his tiny framed body that she recognised but couldn't remember from where.

Then the other guy who'd just smashed his fist into the ground, the huge guy with ginger hair who looked formidable like the strong and silent type. He was the one who had freaked out and attacked them before the blast that had separated them. As for Sasuke he had the same blank unperturbed expression on his pretty boy face with no feelings whatsoever of encountering his old comrades.

Sasuke. That name was a poison of unfulfilled wishes to Sakura. It was unspeakable to her. Seeing him so upfront was both intimidating and exhilarating. Her inside swelled up in anger and anguish...with none being more dominant than the other.

"Suigetsu, would, you, just, shut, up, and, get, me, outta, here!" the Taka girl said indignantly finally squirming and struggling against the wire bounding her of which Tenten grabbed her tighter.

"What, with that attitude. No way...and erm who's the good-looking blonde near you?" he retorted, his smile growing evermore at her predicament; he seemed to be in his element in the heavy snowfall.

"Is that trick talking to me?" stung Ino.

"Give her back to us, now" demanded Sasuke in his deadpan voice over the howling wind.

"Sasuke! I found the Leaf ninja but I knew that I couldn't take them on by myself, so I told them that you'd left this place, knowing that they would still capture me in any case, for precautions sake. That way, when you did come to find me like you always would, we would all be in one place and you could finally get rid of them." sang the Taka girl.

The realisation came clicking on like a lightbulb. The Leaf realised that they'd been duped. She'd deliberately tricked them into falling into a trap. She'd been counting on the fact that they would take her as a prisoner to get what she wanted. Neji growled peeved that he'd not seen this coming.

"Move, you're in our way or we're going to have to take you all back to the Leaf for arrest." said Neji when Ino also stepped forward. Sakura felt anchored on the spot at the sight of Sasuke.

"Sasuke, whatever you're doing here, just stop and come back with us. I don't understand, Itachi is dead, you killed him. You don't have to do this anymore" said Ino. She was confused; he'd done what he'd always intended so why didn't he go back with them. Sakura whished he would answer the question.

Mention of his brother's name by someone unknowing of the hellish, extremely personal complicated and emotional experience of them as Uchiha brothers seemed to ignite Sasuke's aggression.

"Shut up, you don't know anything, and you're annoyingly starting to sound like that brat Naruto. Now let her go!" he spat narrowing his treacherous eyes at Ino. Now it was Sakura's turn, as mention of Naruto's name by the undeserving likes of him unrooted her from her drawback at seeing Sasuke.

Sakura finally stepped forward.

"Sasuke, why are you doing this? Where is he? Where is Naruto?" she whispered.

"I'll say it one more time, give us back Kariin or we take her from you" he said ignoring her question. It stung her. She lost the confidence to speak to him afterward.

Kariin was too delighted and blushed; being demanded back for rescue by Sasuke was like being rescued by her favourite male superhero crush.

"Get out of our way" Neji barked stepping toward Sasuke.

Everyone was on edge; they'd reached an impasse. Sasuke placed his hands on the hilt of his katana, the guy called Suigetsu touched his giant blade and the big guy cracked his knuckles as did Sakura as Ino placed her hands on her ninja tools.

Everything was interrupted by a yelling coming from the left hand side in the forest that caught their attention and made them stop and turn to see where the voice had come from.

"AAAAAH!" came someone's frustrated yell.

They all jerked around to find another member of the Leaf ninja team that they couldn't see precisely as the snow decreased visibility, coming from behind the trees towards them.

Shikamaru Nara stumbled out of the woods holding onto his side and squinted in front of him. The sight of yet another Leaf shinobi who was alive and well delighted them, especially Ino, and angered the opposition. When she saw who it was, she was the first one to run to her fellow former team ten operative and current team captain that she respected so highly. He whined looking at everyone a metre away as he slouched down.

"Shikamaru!" she yelled overcome by emotion and running to greet him.

"Wait Ino- yelled Sakura. She grunted under her breath, annoyed that Ino had made a run during a heated standoff with enemy. It could've easily triggered anyone to jump into fight with the distraction.

From what she could see in the limited visibility, he looked pretty banged up. But, something was not right. He screwed up his eyes in pain and clung onto his side. He was bleeding slightly. The enemy ninja's noticed, so did the Leaf. Relief was quickly replaced by anxiety.

"Looks like he's injured, give us back Kariin so you could tend to your wounded" said Sasuke.

They had no choice. Neji gave the order to let her go and Tenten threw Kariin back to The Taka and unwired her. Kariin stood next to Sasuke smiling at him...until she felt something disturbing.

"Wait, what is that chakra. Another chakra heading this way?" Kariin said looking around wildly about something unknown, feeling a pang through her body.

"What are you talking about Kariin?" asked Suigetsu rolling his eyes, she didn't respond but looked toward the direction where Shikamaru came from. The rest of their eyes trailed as well...

...A thunderous booming sounded somewhere in the forest a few miles behind Shikamaru as scared off birds in the forest flew away.

Sakura momentarily forgot their standoff and looked down at the ground. It began with a gradual vibration below that steadily grew into a full-scale tremor...The ground began to shake violently in a loud grumbling and groaning like a hungry giant was below the surface. Sakura could feel the earth exercising all effort to heave her body down by the sheer force. She looked around frantically at the rest of the ninja trying to hold onto their balance. They looked at each other in surprise. What had started the earthquake...progressed into pounding...galloping...

"No Ino, Run!" Shikamaru yelled suddenly.

She stopped and stared at him in a state of panic as did the rest of the Leaf and Taka group.

"What?" she shouted as the earthquake threatened to topple everyone over.

"RUN!"

The booming noise sounded again from the forest. It sounded like a rapid pounding and stomping gaining momentum and speed with every giant earth shattering gallop. They all looked around in panic. Sakura couldn't see straight, she grabbed a hold of a nearby tree to keep balance as did most of the other ninja. Weak visibility made it worse to look into the far distance. Something was coming... Something massive, colossal, malevolent…

"Sasuke...I don't like this chakra!" yelled Kariin.

"EVERYONE RUN!"

The Taka were the first ones to move. Sakura panicked, she didn't want them escaping but she couldn't deal with them at present. She tried running and stumbling towards Shikamaru to help him but was instantly grabbed by Neji. No time...get away, get away...

"No! You're our best medical ninja, save yourself first. That's an order." he said grabbing her and Tenten to get away as fast as possible.

"Shikamaru!" screamed Ino sprinting to him...no time...get away, get away...

"Ino take him now!" Neji yelled behind him… no one had even a second to think…Sakura could feel her heart beating fast. She could feel the momentum and galloping pace steadily getting nearer and nearer with every steady smashing gallop...it was only a matter of time now...she kept running with everyone else while she closed her eyes for impact...

…Three…Two…One…


	2. Chapter 2:Hide and seek

**Chapter 2: Hide and seek**

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews people, you are awesome...**

**Swanfrost15: So you think it's Naruto? Hmmm...Wait and see...**

**3:47 pm**

Her blue eyes.

All the shock in the world couldn't keep him from witnessing the exploding fireworks lighting up the white sky directly behind him, reflected in her terrified blue eyes as she sprinted full speed towards him. Slow motion. Screaming his name...

Shi. Ka. Ma. Ru...

No time to think or hesitate, it was too late…

Ino Yamanaka hooked her fingers onto the clothing of a slouching Shikamaru to haul him away fast amidst the violent quaking cataclysmic ground threatening to pull her down. She had no time to grab onto his body...he felt it coming...

-BOOM-

Debris of splintering wood, burning trees and snowfalls hovered above them hazardously as the section of forest directly behind Shikamaru and Ino was obliterated. Then.

Bad breath...

Flaming eyes and tail...

Pointed yellow teeth and claws...

The ground threatened to break under the weight of a large black demon spirit that had just arrived...an oni.

It was an enormous black oni: a malevolent demon spirit in the appearance of a massive black, skeletal, emaciated dog...it emitted a furious roar which grew into an intense shockwave that levelled them all, Taka and Leaf ninja ahead of Shikamaru and Ino, to the ground...

They all stumbled trying to get up but had just a second to turn around and see the monstrosity working to destroy them through the heavy snowfall and unsteady ground.

"What the hell is that thing!" shouted Tenten horrified while she scrambled to get up.

Sakura saw it with widened stunned eyes: It was massive. Taller than the tallest tree. Mean and angry and bony liked a starved dog baring its yellow teeth, its flaming red eyes and tail on fire. It's curved yellow claws beating down heavily on the white snow that resembled thick golden horns, threatened to tear them into pieces. They were all stunned by the sheer size of the beast as they struggled, stumbled and fumbled against the quaking ground to run away.

"Everyone! Move quickly!" shouted Neji scrambling with everyone else to get up as he, Tenten and Sakura finally caught up with Sasuke and Suigetsu as the big guy Jugo from the Taka group flung the snooty Kariin girl over his shoulder while they fled.

The black oni dog stretched its thin body backwards for optimum trajectory readying itself to pounce...

"It's coming!" screamed Kariin.

It came charging into the air after them...galloping and stampeding towards the Leaf and Taka ninja ahead. It bared its pointy teeth thirsting for blood, with every earth shattering stomp rippling through the ground...

Ino and Shikamaru found themselves directly below the black oni beast as Shikamaru's injury was slowing them down considerably. Both never paused their running...no time...

The demon dog tried to pry them out from under its belly, directly aiming at them. One of its horn-like claws swiped at Ino's head as she screamed and ducked herself and Shikamaru.

"Ino leave me behind, just go" he yelled.

She completely ignored him, never allowing the thought inside her head; it was unthinkable. She didn't care about shinobi rules of leaving people behind for the sake of a mission. After all, Shikamaru wasn't most people. He was irreplaceable to the Leaf...

The demon dog tried aiming at the people directly in front of it now having failed at trying to thwart the people below its body.

"Jugo, lookout!" yelled Kariin.

Its long flaming red tail circled their heads above...Sakura, Neji, Tenten, Sasuke and Suigetsu all ducked to avoid the fire like whip, but Jugo didn't duck low enough so the impact of the heated tail pushed him over...

The Kariin girl screamed as she and Jugo carrying her fell to the ground. Sasuke fell back to help them. Sakura thought of doing the same thing for their teammates left behind.

"Neji we need to back for Shikamaru and Ino. They need help them now." she yelled.

"All right, Tenten get ready" said Neji. She exchanged glances with Neji and Sakura.

"Sakura back me up" said Tenten jumping forward into the air and pulling out her biggest scroll strapped to her back, summoning some of her larger ninja tools to use against the monster. Fighting in the snowfall with weak visibility was a huge obstacle. She fired as many oversized shuriken as she could at the burning eyes of the beast but they were all sucked into its fire and made the demon angrier.

"That's not going to work. Sasuke this beast contains a relatively small yet strong amount of chakra but it's coming from an outside source" said the girl Kariin as she and Jugo go up.

"So someone's controlling it" he said looking out towards the forest, although he didn't know how they would ever find who was behind the attack as the heavy snowfall and the beast itself were perfect distractions.

Suigetsu unstrapped his giant blade from his back and swung it like a discus, hurtling it through the air, spinning through the air towards the demon dog...it sliced a long cut along its neck as it roared.

Jugo ran forward and tried grabbing its two front legs together to pull it downwards but he struggled to grab a hold of them.

"No, stay away from its mouth and legs, those areas have the most amount of concentrated chakra" yelled Neji using his byakugan.

Its vicious teeth snapped towards Tenten; she was stuck in space as she didn't have enough momentum to jump away. She pulled out her bow staff to swing at the demon's mouth...

"Neji give me a boost" said Sakura. Neji cupped his hands together so she could use them as a launching pad. She flew into the air pressing her two index and middle fingers together and crossing them over to copy a trick once used by her missing teammate.

"Shadow clone jutsu"

A poof of smoke erupted beside her as the second Sakura grabbed Tenten, pulling her away from the dangerous mouth of the beast while the original Sakura came behind, curling her fist to aim at its head...

...but she timed it too late; the black oni saw her and swiped its claws at her. She covered her head for impact but it never came. Instead she was already back on the ground somehow... She felt someone's arms over her body as she looked up. Sasuke Uchiha.

The boy with the shiny black eyes...her old teammate. He'd just saved her. If it hadn't been for the monster terrorising them Sakura would've stopped all movements and gone numb. Sasuke had just saved her...he had just saved her...but there was no time, the giant demon dog pounded its paw at them on the ground...Sasuke grabbed her once again and they were gone in an instant. She'd forgotten that his speed was too difficult to see.

Neji surveyed the demon frantically as best as he could in the heavy snowfall, looking at its chakra. He'd already stated that its mouth and claws had the most chakra concentrated from its chakra points...but he knew that there had to be somewhere where it was vulnerable...

Sasuke quickly slid out his katana. His body soon became an electrical current visible with a blue charge. He appeared under the chin of the beast and stabbed his katana inside the cut made by Suigetsu's blade.

"Chidori!"

Neji found the weakest spot...

"There! Its weakest spot is the chest, aim for its ribcage"

The chidori electrified the monster and it let out a shattering roar of pain as blue light engulfed its entire body, lighting up the sky. It came down on two legs with a crashing thud head down.

"Now Sakura!" yelled Neji.

Sakura jumped onto Jugo's shoulders, propelling herself into the air as she balled up her fist and slammed it into the black oni's skeletal visible ribcage...it was flung high into the air thanks to Sakura's powerful fist, and it expelled one final roar with a fiery rage...before it disappeared in a poof of smoke as Sakura landed back on the snow.

"It's...it's gone...but how?" she breathed.

A frustrated loud shrilly scream followed, piercing the air in an echo. Everyone covered their ears in pain; Sakura immediately recognised it as the same scream she'd heard earlier when she was alone in the forest; but it appeared that she wasn't the only one that'd heard it this time.

When the screech was over and replaced by quietness, Sakura heaved a long sigh, allowing her arms fall to her sides. It was exhausting work.

"What the hell was that thing?" came Sasuke breathing hard whilst sliding his katana back into its shell. His onyx eyes met with Sakura's pale green one's; he looked at her slightly wide eyed like he was seeing her for the first time. The girl who'd finished off the malicious oni demon with such power and grit couldn't be the same annoying clingy person he'd once known...from a distance anyway...

Sakura felt quite guarded staring into Sasuke's gaze but she didn't look away. Her insides were burning for her to ask him why he'd chosen to save her life if he didn't care about her like he'd said a long time ago. Sasuke had saved her. There was a tiny spark of hope that her mission with Naruto had purpose. It changed everything.

"It's gone! Quickly this is our chance to get out of here; before it comes back for us." said Tenten panting.

"And go where? Go where huh? Back into the woods so we can take our chances and hope it doesn't come back to pick us out again? Besides there is a snowstorm coming." said Sakura finally looking away from Sasuke. "It's too late. It'll take another day to get to the Grass Village in these conditions and we'll die from exposure. Not to mention that I'm not leaving without Naruto and we Leaf ninja are still on a mission." she said eyeing every one of the Leaf ninja.

"Are you saying that we're stuck here?" cried Ino holding onto Shikamaru; her body shivered just a little bit more.

Sakura kept quiet. They all did, trying to catch their breath. Frustration was overwhelming.

Neji closed his eyes for a moment in defeat. With him being second in command and due to Shikamaru's momentary incapacitation, he had to take control of the situation.

"Unfortunately there's nothing we can do about it now but improvise and work with what we have. Let's just get out of the cold into that house for now then decide on our next step" said Neji as his gaze met with Sasuke's; it had only just occurred to them that there was only one shelter and two opposing groups.

"Sasuke, what should we do?" asked Kariin beginning to shiver as well.

"We're going into that house Kariin." he announced loudly over the wind so that the rest of the Leaf ninja could hear him and stare at the nerve of him. But that was the nature of Sasuke; someone they'd known as being very confident and self-assured.

The looming silence confirmed it with the rest of the group. The only shelter available for miles...Sasuke never took his eyes of Neji's glowering gaze.

"We can't leave this place Kariin, not like this. We have to get into that house too or we'll die out here." said Sasuke walking forward with Suigetsu.

"Well this should be fun" smirked Suigetsu advancing on Neji.

"Where do you think you're going? Stay back, Sakura found this place first. I'm not letting you inside here." said Neji.

"It doesn't matter who found it first, it's the only shelter in this area and we'll fight for it if we have to. And you can't afford that now can you? With an injured squad member?" said Sasuke.

"We will do whatever it takes to protect the interests of the Leaf Village." Neji stood in his air palm stance while Sasuke and Suigetsu and Jugo positioned themselves together.

"Woah, stay back. Hey just wait a minute!" yelled Tenten coming forward to use her bow staff as a separator, placing the end points horizontally between Neji and the Taka, keeping them apart. Jugo tried smacking her stick out of the way but she blocked him by shoving them all backwards.

"Just hold on alright" she said to both parties as they halted struggling against her. "Neji, we don't have to deal with them right away, they're not our mission remember. You always told us to stick to the scope of the mission which is one of the most essential ninja rules. Right?" said Tenten looking up at him.

"Are you kidding me? Taka and Leaf ninja all under one roof, they're not going to play by our rules! We'll kill each other by the end of the day."

"But our squad has been weakened and we can't fight them anymore." she placed a hand on his shoulder and pointed to Shikamaru. He was still clutching his side as Ino tried to cover his deep wound with her hand. Neji looked over at Shikamaru and relented, thinking of a somewhat positive outcome.

"Then so be it. I guess in this way, since we're all here, we can keep an eye on you Taka."

Tenten lowered her bow staff and walked ahead.

"Ino, are you okay?" Shikamaru suddenly whispered pained. She looked at him incredulously.

"Me? Forget about me, what about you? Are you okay?" she said borderline hysterical.

"I'll be okay, I've been through worse" he said giving a half smile as she shook her head at him. He continued to hunch down as she lifted him up to his feet to follow after Neji. Neji gave Sasuke one final stare as Sasuke followed behind him with his team.

"Neji wait, before we do anything, I need to go look for Naruto" came Sakura behind him. She didn't care about the cold anymore and she couldn't delay it any longer, not after that sinister monster disappearing from sight.

"Wait Sakura. We need to stay together and figure out our standing. Let's go inside this house and regroup first."

He saw the dispirited look on her cold face.

"We will find him, don't worry Sakura, none of us have forgotten. He's a resilient one that Naruto, you know that" said Neji.

"That's not what I'm worried about; it's all these weird things events happening to us since we got to this forest."

"Like I said, if there's anyone who has proven that he can handle anything, its Naruto. He just never quits and he won't quit now because it's snowing or there are unexplained events happening" he said reassuringly.

Sakura nodded her head at him feeling slightly assured. Neji was right, Naruto never allowed anything to keep him away from his goals...

Everyone stood behind Tenten as she moved her frozen feet up the stairs leading to the patio of the house. Sakura looked around at the group of ninja making their way towards the stairs. Both Taka and Leaf were in a mix. She knew it wouldn't end well but she was somehow glad that Sasuke, not his team, were with them; after all she could never allow him to freeze outside. Neither would Naruto...Naruto...

Tenten noticed the wind felt like it had picked somehow as a kind of warning system, screaming for her not to go inside. Sakura felt it too. The house made her feel uneasy, unlike the time she'd first seen it with its luring presence.

Tenten reached the patio and stepped towards the door tentatively, not thinking as she just wanted to get away from the outside.

Sakura's eyes surveyed the outside wall as she clung onto Shikamaru while they all waited for Tenten. Last time she was here, there was a lantern hanging outside on the wall. She remembered it clearly; a single candle inside had left a smoke trail behind after the flame had been blown out. The lantern was gone. She narrowed her eyes as she wondered...how the lantern had disappeared if they were supposedly the only ones in the forest...

Her eyes darted down to something that was present on the outside wall just next to the main door. There was a word carved onto the dark wood. She peered down and saw a name written in kanji: Kamakura. It appeared to be a surname. Was it possible that a family was living here? It seemed unlikely to her that any family would choose to live or own a house in the middle of nowhere...in that kind of forest.

"Hello? Is there anyone here?" Sakura yelled at the house as she stood behind Tenten and Neji.

"What are you doing? Clearly this house is empty" said Neji.

"See that" she said pointing to the name outside the house, "It looks like a family name to me. It could mean that someone or some people are still living here. We don't want to intrude."

"That seems unlikely since no one came outside to check out all the chaos and noise" snapped Kariin from below.

After no one answered, Tenten's uneasy hand reached for the door, again, slowly. She took a big gulp...

"Hold it!" said Ino scaring Tenten with her sudden outburst. She froze her hand...

"What if there's something waiting for us on the other side. Like a trap or something of the sort?"

Tenten looked at Neji. "Well, should we go in?" she asked the second in command.

"We'd better be careful. Let me just scan the inside first" said Neji turning on his byakugan.

"Oh move over, we don't have time for these ninja operations" said Suigetsu pushing his way through everyone and up the stairs towards the front door.

"Suigetsu wait. We don't know what to expect. Let the Leaf check it out for us first then we go in. That way none of us gets hurt if they get attacked." said Sasuke.

"Sasuke, there's no one in that house. I can feel it" whispered Kariin to Sasuke so only he and Jugo behind her could hear.

Sakura exercised all effort not to shoot a glance back at him. She couldn't help but feel stung at his comment. He wouldn't care if his old team was caught up with any danger. It was all about the Taka to him now. So why did he choose to save her from the oni then...

"I don't see anything...go ahead Tenten."

She looked up at Neji who gave her an approving nod. Her frozen hand gripped onto the doorknob; she twisted it slowly as it complained with a hair-raising creak like it hadn't been opened for centuries. The noise reminded her of the scream they'd heard when the dog-like oni had disappeared.

"Here we go" she breathed looking back at the rest of the group who waited with withheld breaths.

Tenten pushed open the door apprehensively...

**4:04 pm**

It was quaint, she thought delighted. The house was an open plan inside where the entrance or genkan leading to the large living room was all one room. But she noticed that even as it was still early evening, the frost and snow solidifying on the small yet few square windows blocked most of the weak sunlight from penetrating through the dark wooded house and even the white fusuma panels; it created a dim ghostly lighting. Tenten could feel the hairs on her back stand on end which had nothing to do with the cold.

Further down from where she was standing at the door, she saw a three seater couch with a neatly knitted quilt blanket on the armrest. There was no fire pit as per usual in a traditional house; instead there was a much needed fireplace, a large bookshelf and a coffee table all resting on the tatami floor. There were only two other doors on either side of the room leading to other rooms of the house. The living room was made to look bigger by all the furniture being concentrated around the fireplace.

Everything seemed to pass the test with her at that point so she realised that there was only one more thing to do.

She stepped through the threshold onto the wooden platform reserved for shoes when entering and exiting the house... immediately she felt a shift in the air inside. It made her tense up and draw in a sharp breath. She moved her head slightly to the left. Then right.

Nothing...two more seconds...

She let out a sigh of relief. Everything appeared to be okay, which was great news for her because she could feel the cold making her nose run.

However as she took a sniff, she noted strangely, how the undeniable and stingy pungent smell of iron filtered through her nose as she turned back to the others.

"Its safe guys, I think it's safe."

Neji, who was standing right behind her, was the only one to see it.

"Wait Tenten. Your nose is bleeding."

She looked at him. "Oh, that's where that irony smell came from; I thought my nose was running from the cold. Looks like it was just that one trail."

"Here let me get that for you" he whispered softly wiping her lower face with the sleeve of his thick white jacket.

"Thanks" she smiled up at him flustered as they waited for the other ninja to head inside; thank goodness for the cold or she'd have to come up with an excuse for her flushed cheeks.

Sakura and Ino lifted Shikamaru to carry him inside their new haven...unfortunately she didn't get the chance to witness Tenten during her epistaxis.

Sasuke and his Taka team took no time bursting in through the entrance and shot straight through to other parts of the house opening and sliding shut the white paper panelled doors, scanning the place.

"Hey wait, where do you Taka think you're going?" said Tenten.

"Don't worry; I'll keep an eye on them. Byakugan!" Neji examined the two rooms opposite the living room with his inherited visual power.

"I can see the Taka in a kitchen. And the door opposite this living room there's a bathroom. There doesn't seem to be any other rooms in the house. Odd, I would've thought this house was a lot bigger judging by the outside."

"What are the Taka doing?"

"Searching the contents of the cupboards and checking for any signs of someone hiding inside here but they're all empty. It's just us, literally."

Sakura and Ino carrying Shikamaru gravitated towards the unlit fireplace.

"Here put him on this couch." said Ino. Both her and Sakura were about to start healing him but he protested.

"Wait, we need to check on the weapon before the Taka comes back. This might be the last few minutes of privacy we're afforded here." he whispered pained. "Ino do you still have it within your backpack?"

Ino opened her bag and found the sealed medical kit which was separate from the standard medical kit and opened it. Among the two syringes, there was one curious looking one with a silvery liquid, heavily wrapped in a sealed transparent plastic.

"Yes, here it is. Okay, this one here in the middle is the poison meant to kill the rogue ninja. In case we can't do it our own way. The other one syringe is an anaesthetic but be careful, it's very potent. One prick of this will paralyse and knock you out for hours."

"But why would Lady Fifth give you this poison. Do we really need it?" asked Tenten.

"We could." said Sakura. "See Lady Tsunade gave us this lethal poison to use if need be because there was very limited information that the Leaf could gather about this rogue ninja. He is extremely elusive even to the people of the Grass. So the reality is, we don't really know what we're up against and Lady Tsunade didn't want us taking and chances with someone we hardly know anything about after what happened to..."

Ino looked away as she met eyes with Shikamaru.

"...to Asuma sensei. This can be used as a last resort if need be"

"So it's our backup plan. Hopefully we won't-

Neji had to stop talking as The Taka had come back marching in which indicated that everything was clear. The two groups looked at each other in animosity, stopping for a second...before the Taka settled next to the Leaf on the coffee table. Kariin couldn't stop fidgeting as she was too uncomfortable around the unpleasant chakra of the Leaf.

"Ah!" Shikamaru exclaimed in pain and crouched down clutching his side.

"Shikamaru! You're still hurt. Just don't move, I'll help you with any chakra I have left" whined Ino.

Sakura ignored all the personal pronouns she'd used. She was about to focus her teal coloured chakra to heal him but once again was quickly side-lined.

"Move over Sakura, you're not the only medical ninja anymore okay" said Ino jealously bending over towards Shikamaru. Sakura was annoyed yet not surprised at Ino's behaviour; all the personal pronouns she'd used were an indication that she wanted to heal him alone. She was always the competitive Ino.

"But I've had the most experience; don't forget you're still my apprentice!"

"Why do you have to always show off with your skills? I'm just as good as you are"

"Are these 'ninja' for real? Going on in meaningless squabbles." asked Suigetsu from the table with the rest of the Taka. Kariin shook her head at them in agreement with Suigetsu as Sasuke looked at the silent big Jugo. The irony was not lost on them.

"No, that's okay, you two can go on and fight with each other, I'll just lie here and die quietly" said Shikamaru sarcastically. They both snapped out of their bickering and healed him. Sakura did most of the work as she had superior skills. His blood began to dry then disappeared.

"How do you feel now?" asked Ino.

"Much better thanks Sakura, Ino."

"No problem." Sakura really wanted to shoot a told-you-so gaze at Ino but felt it wasn't the appropriate time. She threw herself onto a stool next to the unlit fireplace. Exhausted…everyone was exhausted. But they didn't forget for one moment that they weren't alone. They all stared at the people standing in the room with them in an awkward silence.

"How did you get that wound anyway?" came Tenten to Shikamaru.

"Shuriken. They came at me from all over that forest and at close range, out of nowhere. I tried to doge them but they were too quick"

Sakura's eyes shot straight up at Ino. It didn't connect in her head until she looked at Sakura gaze. Her mind was buzzing. Sakura had said that she'd attacked her by hurtling shuriken at her. But if, Shikamaru had been injured by the shuriken she had been throwing, he should've been relatively close by...but both she and Sakura hadn't seen him...She wondered if it explained where the blood on her fist had come from...She looked away from Sakura's penetrating gaze not wanting to acknowledge any of it...

"Shuriken? From where, the rogue ninja or that black beast?" asked Tenten.

"I don't know, I never saw any person. I just saw that horrible black dog come from nowhere and it began growing in size so I tried to get away."

"So then what was that thing outside? A tailed beast?" asked Tenten directing the question to the Leaf ninja.

"Of course not! It was a summoning jutsu, duh, anyone could see that. The chakra was not massive enough for it to be a tailed beast; besides we all saw it disappeared. I thought that much would be obvious…" Kariin snooted, nose in the air. Tenten shot an annoyed glare at her. That Taka girl had to be the most annoying person in the world.

"Hey you Taka girl" said Shikamaru.

"My _name_ is Kariin. Not that you need to know"

"Fine then Kariin, how did you know it was coming before it appeared and from which direction?" asked Shikamaru.

She looked at Sasuke for permission but he stopped her from talking. "No. We don't owe them any information"

"Them?" grunted Sakura outraged. It infuriated her how he'd somehow forgotten that he used to be a part of _'them'_ that he'd referred to.

"That's okay, we can't trust anything she says anyway, don't you remember how she deceived us in the forest? We'll just have to assume that it was a summoning." said Ino.

"If it's a summoning then it must mean that the rogue could've used the beast to keep us occupied so he could escape the forest without being followed by us." said Neji.

"Then what about the scream?" asked Tenten.

"What do you mean?"

"Didn't you notice? The scream only came once the monster disappeared?"

Silence...they needed time to let it all sink in...

But Kariin had noticed it too. The scream had only come once the giant black oni dog was gone. But she didn't say a word out loud. She didn't want to confirm the Leaf girl's observation...

"I've heard that scream before." came Sakura.

"When?" asked Shikamaru.

"Once in the forest before I found everyone else. But there was nothing there to indicate where it'd come from as well. But then it was followed by...never mind. " said Sakura not wanting to explain about hearing a voice or risk coming across as a lune to everyone.

"But then where did it come from. It couldn't possibly be the rogue ninja; he can't still be in the forest with this weather. But if it is him remember we still...we still need to finish the mission" said Shikamaru reserved seeing the Taka team and not wanting to discuss their mission with them.

"You mean eliminate him" came Sakura, there was no way their communication would be effective if they couldn't speak openly.

"Now why would you tell our enemy what our mission is?" scolded Neji.

"Because in case you haven't noticed we're all stuck here together. Sooner or later we're going to have to discuss our mission amongst ourselves and the Taka will still be here."

"That's right. Didn't you notice how we battled that creature? As much as I hate to admit it, it took nearly all of us to get rid of it because we needed each other" said Suigetsu.

"We don't need any one of you Taka-

"Neji wait. He's right; we don't have a choice right now. There's a rogue ninja on the loose and that summoning might've come from him. So we need to remember why we're here. Don't lose sight of our real mission. For now the Taka is not our problem. We have to at the very least coexist."

Everyone from the Taka and Leaf group looked at each other sourly; they had no choice but to stay with each other even when trust was low.

"This is only temporary; we don't need to share all private information with each other, of course." said Kariin.

"So do we all agree on an alliance or ceasefire?" Shikamaru asked.

"Temporarily until the storm stops. But we're not helping you on your mission" said Sasuke.

"I can live with that, are you guys good with that?" Shikamaru asked the rest of his team. They begrudgingly agreed. Sakura wished it had only been Sasuke with them.

"Don't worry guys, in a few months' time; we'll be given a mission to hunt these guys down for good." said Shikamaru grinning.

"We look forward to it" smiled Suigetsu.

**4:16 pm**

It was starting to get dark; the sun had faded to a blue-black twilight into an ever creeping darkness exacerbated by the blizzard over the cabin and frosted windows which didn't allow anymore light through the intensifying the blackness. The group of Leaf ninja and Taka huddled around the unlit fireplace but in their own groupings and separate from their enemy, not speaking and unsure of what to about the Naruto situation as they were all aware of the decreasing visibility.

"What are we going to do now? It's getting really dark." asked Ino finally breaking the long standing silence and directing the question at her only present teammate.

Shikamaru sat up feeling better yet still slightly shaky from his now healed injury. He stood in front of the group of Leaf ninja huddled around the couch to address them except Sasuke's team who sat on the coffee table nearby.

"Okay listen up, this is the current situation. It appears as if were trapped here in this house until the storm subsides with the Taka. Now we don't know how long it will take so we need to get into survival mode and figure out a way to find Naruto, keep sustained, keep warm, and continue tracking the rogue ninja. Those are our top priorities. Sakura what's our standing geographically?"

"Were in what appears to be an isolated house in the main forest eighty kilometres outside the Grass Village. We left Grass Village mid-morning today and trekked from the village through the grasslands to this forest. Currently we are experiencing a severe winter here. That's why we can't leave here yet."

"Huh, how pathetic, taking orders and playing professionals. They'll never get to better ninja like that." said Suigetsu. It was a battle for survival, everyone knew it.

"Oh what you mean with teamwork?" sassed Kariin.

"Please, our teamwork is perfect." said Suigetsu as Kariin raised an eyebrow at him.

Sasuke looked on, he was reminded of a time, centuries ago, when he was on a team mission taking orders and giving them out in organising. He wondered what it would be like if he'd stayed...

"Neji what is the status of the rogue ninja?"

"Absent for now. We lost track of him over two hours ago now upon arrival to this forest when a giant blast knocked us all out. There is still no trace of him using byakugan. No footprints in the snow, trees or in this house and with this blizzard it will be impossible, he would've long since fled. To be quite honest, we're going to have to start from the beginning in tracking. "

"Ino what utilities do we still have among us for survival?"

"We have our backpacks containing sleeping bags, nightwear, dry noodle packs, first aid, a map of the Village Hidden in the Grass and a limited amount of water" she said but from what Sakura could see there were a few more items she was holding inside her pack but didn't call them out; notably their lethal weapon meant to assassinate the rogue. She looked at Sakura and pointed towards the Taka with her eyes. Sakura understood.

"Okay so the situation isn't entirely hopeless. At least we sort of know where we are and we'll be able to support ourselves for a while. As for the rogue, this mission is going to take even longer now. It's such a drag" said Shikamaru.

"Although our sustenance won't last long and we underestimated the weather here, none of us know how long blizzards last here during this time of year. We could end up running out of food" said Tenten. The Taka group and Leaf ninja eyed each other. It could potentially turn into a battle of survival. If that were to happen, the house would turn into a hotbed of chaos...

Neji was leaning against the wall, arms folded. His byakugan eyes weren't activated but somehow a flashing light coming from the corner of his eye caught his attention. He blinked once taken aback and unsure of what had just happened during the strange flash; it appeared that he was the only one that had seen it. He turned on his byakugan eyes to get a better view...and saw the outline of two long thin objects and one square box in what had previously been a bare empty kitchen.

"Would you excuse me for a moment?" he said suddenly.

"Where are you going?" asked Shikamaru.

"I just need to check on something. I'll be right back"

Neji walked into the kitchen studying the insides of the cabinets with his byakugan. What had he seen?

His eyes swept over the cabinet under the kitchen sink and saw it: two long candlesticks accompanied by a matchbox.

He shook his head as he bent down to retrieve the candles and matchbox.

The house had to be alive. It was the only explanation as to how the very objects they needed to combat the darkness would just arrive out of nowhere. He walked back to the group of ninja.

"This is unbelievable. Look at this. I found candles and matches in a cabinet in the kitchen, just as I did another good sweep of the place." said Neji walking back to the living room.

Sasuke looked at his team and exchanged glances with both Neji and Tenten.

"I'm pretty sure those weren't there when we checked the kitchen." said Suigetsu.

"But it's just what we need without having to go into the forest to collect wood for a fire. What a coincidence." said Ino gratefully.

"It's _too_ much of a coincidence…" came Sasuke a short distance away sitting on the table.

Shikamaru contemplated this. "Remember the name written on the wall outside. I think Sakura was right. Someone could be living here, even a whole family. Perhaps they left a few items behind when they left for the winter? Any guess is possible"

"Shikamaru you don't understand. I searched this entire house with my byakugan and the Taka also searched the kitchen thoroughly when we got here and found nothing. These candles and this box of matches appeared out of nowhere, exactly when we needed some light." said Neji.

Shikamaru looked at the ground. Everyone was thinking hard. How could a house provide the provisions they needed the most at the right time, like some magic genie.

"You don't think we're alone, do you Shikamaru?" asked Sasuke remembering his apparent 'genius' from his Leaf ninja days.

"That's the weird part. Anyone living here would've had to come back to the house to avoid freezing to death. There's no way that they could make it to the Grass Village alive in this weather. And we didn't see anyone else's trails did we?"

"Well then what about the rogue?"

"That's a good question. Maybe it was him who was here, but once again if he was, where is he now? There's no way that he would make a run for it out of the forest, it could take a whole day because the storm would wipe him out. He would have had no other choice but to come back to this house just like us or risk dying to try and get away from this isolated place."

"Maybe he's already dead" said Neji.

"Nah, I don't think so. Remember what Lady Hokage told us, this guy might be unpredictable but he's shrewd. He probably was the one that knocked us all out with a blast and cast the summoning jutsu to get away if he did manage to get away. Besides he's a rogue ninja and he wouldn't be dumb enough to stay in the cold-

A thought clicked into Sakura's head. It was unforgivable that it had taken that long...she was the worst teammate in the world.

"Oh my goodness, Naruto! What if he's got Naruto? He's still missing and he's going to die out there. I have to go and get him." she cried jumping up.

"She's right. You should've sent out a search party to go and find him hours ago...Naruto will never find this place by himself, so Kariin and I will also go and find him" said Sasuke…

Sakura was the first one to look up at him and gasp. If she hadn't heard it with her own ears she would've never believed it. Stunned. She was stunned by what he'd said. Everyone from the Leaf team looked at him in stunned surprise; he'd claimed a long time ago that he didn't care about Naruto but now was willing to go look for him in the most relentless ruthless weather.

"What did you just say?" she breathed unbelieving. Even Kariin looked speechlessly at him.

"I'm going to go personally find Naruto myself because he's still lost, and most of you Leaf ninja seem unwilling to go yourselves. I'm going to bring him back here to us..."

There was a disconnect in her head. Did he have any idea what he'd just said?

_He's lost...I'm going to bring him back here to us..._ Where had she heard that speech, those familiar words before? Her mind couldn't decide whether it was Sasuke or Naruto himself speaking. She couldn't hold it in...

"How dare you. How _dare_ you. I know you don't care about him. You said that yourself. So why this now?" said Sakura bitterly.

"It's within my-our own interests" said Sasuke as blank toned as possible.

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

Like I said before, I don't owe you any explanations, I have my own reasons. C'mon Kariin, I need you to locate him for me" he said standing up with Kariin right behind.

Kariin tried to whisper as closely as she could to Sasuke's ear, taking delight in being so close to his perfect body as Sakura felt a vein growing in her temple.

"Sasuke, if you're talking about the ninetails boy...I don't...I don't sense his chakra anywhere." she whispered.

"What did you just say? What do you mean 'sense' his chakra?" asked Sakura overhearing and feeling alarmed staring at her, hoping she'd misheard. "You know what; nobody cares what comes out your mouth anyway because you're just a liar. I'm not letting you two go after him."

"Nobody cares what comes out my mouth? Nobody like Sasuke?" she teased. Sakura gritted her teeth. She could feel her control slipping...

Sasuke turned away annoyed and walked with Kariin towards the door but was barred by Neji.

"Sakura's right. You're not going outside there; we can't trust you Taka to be alone. And you could expose our location to anything else waiting outside" said Neji.

"What a quick change of heart; first he doesn't want us to come into this house and now he's begging us to stay" mocked Suigetsu.

"That is not my problem if you don't trust us, now move." said Sasuke.

"No way, I won't allow you to go after Naruto by yourselves. I'm going to find him and bring him here without you." said Sakura taking a firm stance. He knew better. He had to have known better. Sasuke was both the gun and the trigger holding power over Naruto's emotions that would always set him off.

"And that goes for you as well Sakura, we haven't decided on what do to collectively yet. Just stay put for now" said Neji.

"So I'm supposed to let him die out here? Is that what you want?"

"I don't wish for him to die, I just think it wouldn't be helpful if we go out there and die ourselves or jeopardise our location. We need to plan this first." he said with increasing agitation.

"Neji, any shinobi of their worth would risk their lives to save their comrades. We knew the risks when we took on this mission" Ino added.

"No we thought we knew all the risks until _he_ made a miscalculation about the sheer scale of this mission and forest. And now were stuck here with no way out" came Neji shooting an accusing finger at Shikamaru.

Sakura, Ino, Tenten and Shikamaru stopped, taken aback by Neji's sudden outburst. It came striking at them from nowhere.

"Neji what is wrong with you, it's not like he knew this would happen" Sakura said shocked by his sudden outburst; it was so unlike him. Why was he so angry all of a sudden? Tenten couldn't say anything at that moment.

"Would you just gimme a break. Weather we were prepared for the forest or not, the same thing would've happened to us. Clearly this storm was well on its way when we got to this forest"

"Yeah it's not his fault" said Ino defending him. She couldn't stand for someone criticising Shikamaru unfairly.

"Everyone be quiet. Now if we want to survive, we need to find Naruto in calm and progressive way." Neji said with an ever hostile tone.

Sasuke looked straight at Neji blocking his way out.

"Move. We're going to- came Sasuke.

"We're not _going _anywhere; you don't have the authority to make decisions for anyone here. This is the Leaf ninja's mission and I will do anything to keep us safe." said Neji with an ever hostile tone.

Sasuke teleported closer to challenge him before Neji could even blink. Neji was caught off guard as he took a step backwards.

They all watched the two guys anxiously, especially Jugo who was just about ready to pounce. All Sakura wanted to do was go looking for Naruto. It was proving impossible to even get out of the house.

"Do you think you can stop me? Get out of my way!" Sasuke pushed Neji aside who didn't let him pass by. He grabbed Sasuke's hand to push him back but Sasuke held onto his jacket under his neck. Suigetsu jumped up and waited next to Sasuke holding onto the hilt of his blade waiting for orders.

Suddenly Neji and Sasuke were at each other's throats grabbing each other by the collars of their jackets as Shikamaru, Tenten and Ino jumped up to stop the looming altercation, Neji turned on his byakugan absent mindedly. Sakura stood where she was frustrated by what was happening, whereas Kariin and Jugo stood watching intently.

"C'mon cut it out guys! We really don't need this right now" whined Shikamaru annoyed; he really didn't want to get into a fight that was about to break out with everything else happening.

"Just try me Uchiha, I dare you" Neji spat holding onto Sasuke's collar.

"Why are you trying so hard to stop me from finding Naruto huh? When he's one of your own anyway?"

"How do we know that_ you_ haven't taken him anywhere, it wouldn't be a surprise considering that you've already betrayed the Leaf Village for some cracked 'brother' of yours that you claimed you hated no less…"

"Neji!"

The room froze.

The air froze.

The silence, crushing.

Tenten and the rest of the Leaf ninja team gasped at the below-the-belt comment. He'd gone too far. Sakura cringed; she'd been afraid of this.

An awkward, heavy, stinging, uncomfortable silence wiped through both teams of ninja and competed with the roaring loud wind outside for power after what had just been said. Sakura couldn't look at Sasuke. She couldn't exhale. It wasn't safe.

The personal ugly truth that had been on every Leaf ninja's mind for years was exposed. The truth that they were too afraid to speak out about. Sakura stared at the ground stiffly.

Sasuke's eyes turn a brilliant dangerous shade of red. He grabbed Neji tighter...The ignorant bastard Neji Hyuuga standing in front of him had no idea; no idea of the damaging floodgates he'd just opened. No idea of the struggle he'd just made mockery of...No idea.

"Mangekyo...Shari-" he whispered breathy.

Tenten, Ino and Shikamaru mobilised swiftly.

Sakura couldn't move.

"No Sasuke don't! Take him away" yelled Tenten from behind. Shikamaru pushed them apart while Tenten slapped her hands over Neji's eyes, pulling him away from the danger while Jugo and Suigetsu pulled Sasuke away to the other side of the room away from Neji.

"It's okay Sasuke, just let it go, he doesn't understand." said Jugo quietly as angry as he was that someone had hurt Sasuke.

"I swear I'll kill you if try me again. DO YOU HEAR ME?" Sasuke yelled furiously.

"Sasuke calm down" Kariin tried.

"Don't touch me" he said smacking her hands off his shoulders. "Just come here Kariin." he said fiery as she took a little skip to catch up with him and walk beside him.

Sasuke stormed into the kitchen fuming as Kariin came after him. He had his back to her...he needed a moment to calm down after the ordeal, he couldn't look at anyone.

"Damn those Leaf ninja!" he said slamming his fist on the wooden counter, making Kariin jolt with his aggression.

"Kariin where do you sense Naruto?" he demanded.

"Sasuke...like I said before, I can't sense him anywhere..." she whispered.

"Seriously? How can you not sense his chakra, he has a powerful fox spirit inside him that's hard to miss!"

"I know but there's nothing I can do if I can't feel it, it's not my fault...but Sasuke, I don't understand, he's that boy always chasing you. Didn't you say you don't care about him anymore? Why do you care so much now?"

"You're forgetting Kariin; we have an obligation to make sure that he's captured by the right people. I can't fulfil my own ambitions without this working. If Naruto's been taken by some lucky opportunist, then we have to go and get him back!"

"But we-you betrayed them, the one with the mask. We don't owe them anything anymore"

"I know, but Naruto is a highly valued prize for them so he can be used as leverage for a bargain if need be. I didn't want them to have power over me. I want to make my own decisions my way. I still want my revenge. I'm still hungry for the vengeance I haven't received yet. The Leaf...They took him from me..." he said looking away with his malicious red eyes.

Kariin didn't know what to say to appease him; she'd never seen him so aggressive. "Sasuke..." she said softly feeling guarded. "Are you okay...?"

"Go back to the living room; I'll be there in a minute"

Kariin walked away giving him one final worried look.

He was finally left alone with his thoughts. Sasuke tried to control his trembling hands. There was no use being angry because he knew that he would have his vengeance one day...he eyes shot up at the ceiling to keep the burning tears at the bottom of his eyes firmly locked inside. The wound...his wound was still too fresh...

As Sasuke stared up at the ceiling trying to keep his emotions at bay, his powerful red eyes...noticed it immediately.

Hiding in plain sight.

Dangling from above.

No wonder Kariin didn't sense it.

His shock grew. He should've turned his sharingan on a long time ago. All the other ninja in the house had no idea of the enormous jutsu he could see being used against them all...so much power...There was no way that they were in that house alone...

Back in the living room as Kariin walked back to Suigetsu and Jugo, everyone there noticed that she'd come back alone.

"Where's Sasuke?" Sakura asked Kariin. Kariin shot a nasty glance at her and sat back down next to Suigetsu not answering back. Sakura threw herself back into the black stool next to the fireplace again.

"Just forget him Sakura, that jerk needs to cool down" said Tenten still angry that Sasuke almost used a harmful ninjutsu on Neji. Jugo cracked his knuckles dangerously at her.

"Jerk? Did you just hear what Neji-?"

"-Sakura! Please don't start. It's not helping the situation. Everybody just calm down okay; we're all frustrated and it's making us irrational." said Shikamaru. Neji brows furrowed.

"So what are we going to do about Naruto already!" said Sakura.

"Okay how's about this, we wait for Naruto for another ten minutes and if he's not back by then, you and Neji will go into the forest and use his byakugan to scan the area again, we'll give you two ten minutes also. After ten minutes you two come back regardless of the outcome. If you two don't come back in ten, we'll come for you knowing that you might be in danger. If he still isn't found we all go find him together and this time we stay together. We don't have much choice. I say we stick with the plan and wait for Naruto and go look for him if he's not here in ten minutes then go from there. Is everyone okay with that?"

They all nodded their heads grateful that Shikamaru was their squad captain.

"Okay good. Then we wait. Ten Minutes."

**4:50 pm**

It was the longest ten minutes of Sakura's life. Naruto was still somewhere out there in the freezing blizzard. She sat on the cold stool, head buried in her hands in stress listening to the snow and wind hammering on the house. She then lifted her head up and looked around the room full of Leaf ninja and Taka. In a situation like this with no proper authority, strip away all the learning, tools and all they really were, she realised, were just teenagers stuck in a snowed in house in a foreign land, lost and not knowing what to do.

She looked over to Shikamaru lying back on the couch watching the clock now and then mounted high on the wooden wall and Ino sitting next to him looking disgustedly at Suigetsu eyeing her with a cheeky eyebrow lift and smirk with his large incisor poking out his top lip. Tenten had lit candles that Neji had mysteriously and conveniently found earlier, placing two on the coffee table. Then she walked back to Neji leaning against the wall and seemed to be reassuring him by talking to him softly. She noticed that Sasuke was still somewhere they didn't know.

She was watching everyone. Hearing only the terribly loud tick, tick, tick…of the clock in her mind, she realised that she was getting restless and anxious. Her eyes darted back to the bookshelf she'd seen earlier. Sakura stood up, completely fed up and hoping to kill time as she walked to the bookshelf with everyone's eyes following the only thing moving in the room besides the clock.

When she got to the large wooden bookshelf, she noticed crumpled pieces of paper shoved in between a few book spaces and pages; it added unkemptness to the otherwise neatly arranged shelf. She looked at the assortment of books, slightly intrigued by them, reading the spines of some of the books:

Broken Pieces of Silver, White Lotus, and Kunoichi on the Battlefield: A History of the Female Ninja…they all sounded interesting to her. She picked out the book titled 'Kunoichi on the Battlefield: A History of the female ninja' curious to find out about kunoichi before her time. She opened the book...

Betrayer of mine (5)

I will surely bury you (7)

You do seppuku (5)

Sakura's brows furrowed at the text in surprise; it was not what she'd expected. There was no research or narrative about female ninja she'd been hoping to read.

Instead the numbering written after each verse indicated that it was rather a somewhat grim haiku about killing a betrayer, or someone killing themselves by the 'seppuku' word. She swept out the mental image of Sasuke out of her mind. The betrayer... She flipped through the rest of the pages...

Blank, blank blank...

She noticed glumly that it was the only writing in the entire book. What could've been an interesting read for her was nowhere to be found. No history of female ninja, nothing. Sakura turned to the cover of the book to check who the author was. But the author's name was missing throughout; it wasn't written at the bottom of the page, below the poem, on the spine of the book or the back.

She slid the book back disappointingly back into place and read the spines of other books on the shelf. Then...

One book or its title in particular caught her attention. Merely looking at it made her heart beat faster. She stared at in curiosity and feeling uneasy. The book entitled:

'Hide and Seek'

Her mind shot back to the voice she'd heard in the forest. It had said something to the order of..._hide and seek_...she was sure of it. But was there a possible link...

Her hand shakily hovered over it curiously; she reached for it slowly...and touched it.

-Instantly a flash sparked inside her mind—

-A pink swing with rusted chains-

She gasped in shock and began sweating.

Sakura drew back her hand from the book and breathed. No doubt that she was completely spooked. It had happened too quickly for her to come to terms with what was happening. Her hands were shaking. Her eyes shifted towards the other ninja in the room. None of them seemed to notice that something clairvoyant and creepy had flashed in her mind...what was it...what did it mean...she wondered...why were all the unexplained events she experienced connected to that one concept...hide and seek...

Her curiosity spurred her on to touch the book again. Nothing. She took out the book cautiously and opened it...

Seek, seek, seek, seek

Seek, seek, seek, seek

Dopple

Grounded

Outside

hide hide hide hide

A place to hide

She once again flipped through the pages of the book...this time it was the same poem on every page exactly as it was. She placed the book back, happy that it made no sense; she had been spooked. Although she noticed this one was different than the previous poem.

It was written with furigana above the kanji characters and the writing was simplistic, which suggested that it was written by or for a child...She slipped the book back into its place on the shelf. So much for killing time...But that last one had been pretty close to messing with her head.

"What you got there Sakura?" She turned around and saw Shikamaru walking up to her with his hands in his pockets. She contemplated telling him what had happened to her but decided against it.

"Oh nothing much, it's a, well a bookshelf with obscure poetry so far. This one's dated about a year ago. Come see." she said hoping to distract him from the ticking time bomb. She picked out the book called 'Broken pieces of Silver' and flipped to a random page.

Ereben spoon

Ereben cups

Ereben plates

No one eating

No knife allowed

Once again, to Sakura's dismay, the poem was very vague; there was no reference or clue as to what it could mean or how to interpret it. She flipped through the pages and saw that it was the only poem in the book. Again. The rest of the pages were completely blank adding an odd nature to the books on the shelf.

"I don't think I understand it, but I've never really been one for poetry anyway" said Shikamaru shrugging.

"I don't get it either, these books are just useless" she sighed but still relieved.

She slammed the book and involuntarily looked at the time. Naruto had roughly less than one minute to arrive or a complicated search party would have to go looking for him. It wouldn't turn out good. She had no choice but to stroll back to her stool having lost the contest with time...it was back to...

tick, tick, tick…

She looked at the time restlessly, it was maddening. One minute is equivalent to sixty years with impatience. She was so afraid of having to go and search for Naruto with Sasuke and his bloody girlfriend alone, or just go outside with lurking dangers...But Naruto; she couldn't even imagine where he was in that kind of a storm...

tick, tick, tick...

Tenten looked over to Sakura. She was incredibly stressed. Guilt washed over her as she thought about the spat they'd almost started. She knew it was unfair to call Sasuke a jerk but Neji...she had to protect him. He was her teammate and she was loyal to him. But Sakura. She'd helped save Neji's life in a way that she wouldn't know how to. She swallowed her pride.

Tenten walked over to Sakura and crouched down to where she was sitting on the stool then placed a hand on her lap. Sakura looked at her apologetic eyes.

"I'm sorry Sakura, for what I said. It wasn't the best time..."

"Is Neji going to apologise for what he said?"

She took a pause after Sakura's annoyed vent. "You know Naruto's been through a lot worse; he can handle a storm like this" she whispered when time was almost up.

Sakura strapped on her backpack. "We'll just have to see about that won't we?

Sakura looked up to Shikamaru who nodded his head at her. She stood up and walked away to the door, as Neji followed after her. She didn't have time for any harsh feelings now; her only focus was finding Naruto"

Kariin sat next to Suigetsu by the coffee table still thinking about Sasuke. Watching the two Leaf ninja heading out to find the ninetails made her nervous. She straightened her glasses on her nose and wondered if she should make Sasuke aware that the Leaf was going to find their missing teammate.

"Where's Sasuke now? Is he still in the kitchen?" whispered Jugo. Kariin nodded her head and stood up. Shikamaru, Ino, Sakura, Neji and Tenten's eyes shot to her curiously like carnivores smelling meat. It wasn't going to be easy to inform Sasuke privately in the kitchen. If she even took one step in the direction of the kitchen, the Leaf ninja would be on to her. She looked at the time...ten minutes was almost up...

...Six...five...four...

Once the two Leaf ninja had left, she would have to chance it; run to inform Sasuke quickly before...

-PANG-

Kariin felt her body lose balance as a pang shot through her almost pushing her over. Luckily she was caught by Jugo.

"What was that- yelled Kariin involuntarily. Everyone stares fixated on her. She'd felt it vibrate through her entire body. A massive chakra force appearing out of nowhere.

-BANG!-

A loud single slam against the wooden wall outside made everyone jump in startle and placed them in high alert. The fright was not as unnerving as a faint voice trying to be heard from outside.

**5:00 pm**

"…'M'on let me in!...Freezing out here…'ikamaru, 'akura. Let .me in. Please guys…"

Sakura could almost scream. Her hand shot up to her mouth...it was finally her turn. Her turn to jump up in relief...

Shikamaru's eyes grew wide in shock...It was impossible...

The whiny loud voice was all too familiar to the Leaf ninja group who welcomed the voice at their stressful time. Ino, Tenten, Neji, Shikamaru and of course Sakura looked at each other auspiciously, with Sakura's eyes lighting up before Shikamaru walked to the door, opening it with disbelief etched onto his face...but he was almost trampled by the rambunctious gung-ho championed underdog and spitfire that he saw, enter, Naruto Uzumaki.

"Hey Naru-

"Shikamaru! What happened-where are we-oh my goodness-I'm freezing-I'm starving—we're all going to die-how am I going to eat ramen in this place?!" he yelled rapidly all in one breath jumping inside and looking around. "Where is Neji that jerk-I'm gonna kill him for leaving me behi-huh…"

Naruto looked behind Shikamaru at his only teammate present. Sakura could feel the heavy burden being lifted off her shoulders yet another one took its place. How was she going to protect Naruto where they were? Especially because of the whole Sasuke matter...

"Sakurah, Sakurah! You made it!" he said balling up his fists and punching the air in triumph then went over to her.

"Naruto, you're back, thank goodness." she said unable to help but laugh and hug him tightly. She could feel tears burn the insides of her eyes. Finally after hours of uncertainty. It was all over. They hugged for about another minute as everyone looked on. Then she had to take out her frustrations and relief by growling angrily at him.

"Naruto you idiot! Where have you been? We've been dying of worry!" she growled punching his blond head and shaking him by the collar.

"Ouch!…Sakurah. I'm s-sorry Sakurah, It wasn't my fault. Ahhh!" he whined. Everyone from the Leaf cracked in a smile or a light laugh even the inflexible Neji who at least, looked better than before. There was no one in the world quite like Naruto to cheer up a grim mood.

"Finally Naruto. What happened to you?" said Shikamaru smirking at the kid who fascinated him until the end of time.

"I don't know, I erm think that I hit my head after a blast-

Naruto's eyes shot up as he gasped in outrage. He'd just noticed most of the Taka sitting by the table. "What the hell are they doing here!" he spat pointing rudely at them.

"Ah it's the ninetails jinchuriki again. Here we go with the annoying loud talking and yelling" complained Suigetsu feeling wary as Jugo looked angrily and Naruto just the same. He was the one who'd gone crazy and attacked Sasuke which in turn made him lose control when he tried protecting Sasuke before the blast...

"Relax Naruto, we have no choice, they're sharing the space with us…for now" said Shikamaru.

"What? No way, since when have we ever allowed rogue ninja's on our team. I'm never going to 'share space' with _them" _He curled up his fist. "Where's Sasuke?"

The Leaf ninja kept quiet. Nobody dared point out Sasuke's location to the likes of Naruto. The same explosion of chaos would just erupt again like it had before the blast.

"He stormed off to the other side of that door." said Suigetsu pointing to the kitchen. Clearly he didn't care what the results of his actions could be.

"You Taka have no tact, do you? You want to have the same thing happen again to them. Sasuke is your teammate after all" said Neji shaking his head.

"No Neji! Stop it! Don't' say that. _They're _not Sasuke's team, _we_ are. He is a Leaf shinobi" yelled Naruto narrowing his eyes at the Taka. All he wanted now was to go to the kitchen.

"Would you give it a rest already; we have a crisis on our hands before anything else."

"SASUKE!" Naruto called out to him.

"Oh here we go again!" groaned Tenten.

Sasuke walked in the room. Naruto's eyes shot to him immediately as did everyone else. The tension between them was frightening, especially because of the kind of passion Naruto had to his word of bringing back his best friend. All the history, rivalry, bitterness, anger, friendship, hatred and resentment reflected in both their heavy eyes.

"Sasuke" exclaimed Naruto quietly at him.

"Naruto, you made it. Took you long enough. Where were you? " he said looking over to his team.

Naruto flared his nostrils and narrowed his eyes.

"No Naruto don't do this again. It's partly the reason why were stuck here" said Sakura standing in front of him.

"Make sure that he doesn't disappear and keep him away from me!" said Sasuke casually.

"What did you say!" yelled Naruto. Sakura, Neji and Tenten blocked Naruto from advancing forward towards Sasuke while Jugo and Suigetsu flanked Sasuke leaning against the wall.

Shikamaru however didn't join the struggle. His eyes were solely focused on the only female of the Taka team and Ino noticed.

"What's wrong Shikamaru?" she asked.

"Something's off; there's just something about this house that's giving me the creeps"

"Like what? What do you mean?"

"I don't know...the timing. We all acknowledged that it was getting too dark for us to see. Then Neji sees two candles and a matchbox come from nowhere. Then we decided to wait for Naruto to arrive. Then he comes exactly after ten minutes...it's weird" he said staring back at the Taka girl.

Kariin was looking around wildly about the room wide eyed and alarmed as if she was seeing something only visible to her. She noticed Shikamaru looking at her and stared at him. She had hoped that they'd all forgotten about her outburst before the ninetails arrived but clearly the sharp Leaf ninja didn't. Judging by the look on his face, he wanted to know what she'd felt. What she'd felt before Naruto arrived.

Kariin was frozen. She tried to filter out the rambling and yelling of the ninetails. It had definitely been there. No doubt about it. It had disappeared in an instant.

It was another chakra, an intoxicatingly choking chakra different to the ninetails boy. But she'd felt it not even a second before the jinchuriki boy had arrived, and it disappeared just as fast...so whose new chakra had it been and where did it go. No way was it the rogue ninja, she would've still felt it...she couldn't hold it in any longer. She was incredibly frightened.

"Sasuke. What was that?" she said softly looking towards him leaning on the wall. Sasuke looked at her in surprise; so did the rest of the ninja group seeing her shocked face.

"What are you talking about?" asked Sasuke as everyone looked on.

"That chakra...whose extra chakra was that that I'd felt and just left, apart from this ninetails boy?"

"Did you sense another chakra? From whom? The rogue?"

"I don't know, it was incredibly potent but now it's completely gone. It's different from anyone I've felt. I can't feel it anymore." she said eyeing her Taka team who grew worried; Kariin always felt chakra continuously that had never disappeared.

"Why should we trust anything you say to us?" snapped Sakura.

"Because if you don't want to die, you'd better start believing me. The chakra that I sensed, it came and was gone a second before that ninetails boy arrived" she said. She tried thinking about it..."Wait a second, you there with the spooky dead looking eyes, did you say that you scanned the entire forest for the rogue ninja and didn't find any traces?" she referred to Neji.

"Yes" said Neji through gritted teeth and pausing after the offensive remark.

"And there are no footprints but our own in the snow outside..."

"Erm Kariin was it; do you sense any chakra of anyone outside but us?" asked Shikamaru.

"I can sense the chakra of everyone in the entire Grass Village hours away and all of ours in this room. There's no one and nothing in the forest."

Sasuke looked up at her; Kariin would never divulge any piece of information to strangers, something must've really spooked her.

Sakura looked away pensively and Shikamaru noticed, she'd just remembered something.

"What is it Sakura?"

"When I got here to this house earlier before I found anyone, there was a lantern hanging outside that had only just been blown out by the wind which means someone had just been here prior to us, and Neji didn't find any trace of the rogue in the forest when no one could escape his gaze, nor can this Kariin girl but the rogue ninja couldn't have escaped because even he must've known that a blizzard was coming…" she whispered with every word becoming breathy.

Shikamaru gave her a knowing look and she exchanged glances with him and even Kariin, she knew immediately that he was thinking the same thing, as she knew that he had such an elysian intelligence at problem solving.

Then it came.

It came like a creeping stalking realisation. The thought. The realisation. Kariin stood up slowly. She had no idea where the chakra had disappeared to but she did know where she'd felt it...it was alarming...

"Where did you feel this chakra last before it disappeared?" asked Shikamaru.

"Within this room...amongst us"

"So what does that mean exactly? You're scaring us a little here with all the suspense. Spit it out Taka" whined Ino.

"What? What is it, what have you discovered?" asked Neji with fourteen pairs of eyes staring intently at her. She took a moment to breath before answering him.

"It's one of us…it has to be…someone here is using some kind of transformation or body doubling jutsu to impersonate and blend in and is pretending to be either a Leaf shinobi or one of us Taka. One of us in this group is the rogue ninja…One of us is an imposter…" she whispered.

The information and realisation hit them all like a ton of bricks. All six Hidden Leaf ninja and Taka gasped in shock and stared suspiciously around...swift shooting eyes going around wildly scanning in full shinobi mode trying to find the cockroach among them...to try and figure out who it could be quickly in alarm. The rules had just changed...


	3. Chapter 3: Hide And Seek

**Chapter 3: Hide And Seek**

**A/N:** Swanfrost: Thank you so much for your critique, it's just the kind of comment I've been hoping for. Literally you've picked up on my biggest weakness. I did notice that there is a lot of redundant contrived dialogue and I apologise for that, but honestly I was so afraid of trimming because I'm balancing a lot of information in two plot themes and I didn't want anything to get lost. From now on though there will be an emphasis on dialogue because the mystery plot is about to unfold and the characters will solve it through discussion. Having said this I have kept your invaluable advice in mind for this one...

**5:06 pm**

The sun had vanished. The hurricane blizzard boomed and battered the outside hungrily, jealously trying to force itself inside the one lone house.

The Will of Fire began its struggle to remain burning under the tiny flickering flame of the candlelight casting shadows on the corners of the house, working to expose any underlying secrets.

Kariin of the Taka pulled her glasses off, revealing unfocused eyes.

"Sssomebody...in this room is the rogue ninja. I sensed another chakra in this room before it disappeared. The scumbag's blending in among us. Who is it!" she cried huffing and puffing; she backed up slowly, eyes darting all around.

Her knees began to shake violently...Sakura watched unnerved with her pounding overworked heart; how would they prevent a somewhat stranger from slipping into insanity...

"How...how is he doing it..." whispered Shikamaru, shaking his head as he heaved a tired burdened sigh.

The tension was thicker than the snow falling outside; sneaky and suspect eyes darted around the group of ninja with razor sharp instincts, implicitly trying to figure out who would make the first move while aiming to make it look like they weren't.

It began with the slight inhale of breath...the ever so slightly twitch of a finger...the undetectable shifting of narrowed eyes. But little did they all know that the only thing worth fearing was fear itself...

Sasuke's sharingan eyes anticipated the move just before it happened. The sudden twinge of Tenten's hand near her pocket triggered a ripple effect.

Everyone swiftly jerked and drew out their weapons of Kunai, shuriken, executioner's blade, Asuma's chakra blades in Shikamaru's hands, Tenten and her long thin bow staff, Sasuke and his Katana with Neji in his air palm stance. Nobody dared move. The deadly ninja weapons were brandished within an inch of each other's faces...

Sasuke pointed his kunai at Tenten as she'd made the first move-Neji stood at the ready in his air palm stance towards Sasuke-Jugo pointed his fists at both Neji and Naruto-Shikamaru pointed Asuma's chakra blades at Suigetsu holding his executioner's blade near Shikamaru's face-Ino pointed her kunai at Sakura who did the same to Ino-Naruto pointed his shuriken at Kariin, he didn't believe for one minute that she was telling the truth, but his eyes remained firmly fixed on Sasuke...

"Everybody stand back! NOW!" Neji yelled with beads of sweat forming on his temple. The ninja group jumped backwards away from each other except the Taka. Naruto delayed his move as he was still unbelieving about the hidden rogue ninja.

"-Don't tell me that you guys actually believe this girl! -"

"-We don't take orders from the Leaf-" Jugo said crunching his fists.

"-Stay where you are _Taka _or we're all going to start a war with each other-" came Neji.

"Guys, don't believe her, she's lying! There's no way the rogue could get away with it so perfectly; how would he know our personalities well enough to pretend to be one of us? Huh? She's trying to turn us against each other. Nobody's been acting out of the ordinary." said Naruto.

Silence descended on the group as everyone took a moment to soak in his words, trying to recall any shinobi from memory who had been behaving strangely. Moments later, Neji, Sakura and Ino's stressed eyes met; they'd both just remembered the white forest earlier...

"You're all forgetting something...Kariin only felt the different chakra that vanished exactly before Naruto arrived" said Sasuke indifferently.

Every pair of narrowed eyes flew to the last arrival of the house. Naruto's brilliant blue eyes grew wide at them all-

"-It's him! The fake Naruto. Take him away" pointed Ino backing away from him.

Sakura whipped around to look at Naruto behind her. She saw his wide eyes...

The only dark haired Jonin of the Leaf ninja group ran up to Naruto. Sakura gasped in fright, it all happened too quickly; she tried blocking Neji by standing in front of Naruto but Ino grabbed her arm pulling her away swiftly.

Neji grabbed Naruto while Ino moved Sakura out of the way and slammed him into the wooden wall above the fireplace, pinning him there in the corner.

"Neji what the hell do you think you're doing?" shouted Naruto shocked at the instant and hasty move along with the others who had also just remembered. Naruto had been the last to arrive.

"Tell us one thing that you and only you would know about either yourself or any of us. Now" he barked holding a kunai to Naruto.

"Why are being you so violent Neji? What if he's the real Naruto?" yelled Sakura pulling her arm free of Ino's grip.

"He was gone for three hours Sakura. Naruto was the last one to arrive when this girl felt the new chakra disappear. 'Naruto!' you have twelve seconds or I hurt you" he threatened with a kunai in his hand pointing viciously towards Naruto...

"-You don't scare me. I know that I'm the real Naruto and I don't have to prove it to you! -" spat Naruto narrowing his eyes at him.

"-Eight seconds-

"-You're bluffing-

"Am I?" Neji stabbed Naruto in the stomach with his kunai. He let out a howl of pain as Sakura gasped in shock and screamed with Naruto. His thick orange jacket stained a deep red of his blood seeping out. The situation escalated without a moment to pause...

Sakura couldn't keep up, it happened before it registered in her head. All the Leaf shinobi in the room were left reeling while the Taka waited to find out whether the rogue had been caught. Tenten was frozen on the spot unbelieving. Neji and his unjustified cruelty...

"Naruto!" Sakura exclaimed running up to him.

"Jugo, stop her now! Take her away" barked Sasuke pointing to his former team seven teammate.

Jugo ran up to Sakura and locked his forearms over her arms and shoulders, restricting her movements.

"Shikamaru, guys, help me!" she cried to the other Leaf ninja.

Shikamaru, Ino and Tenten's stricken eyes stared at each other then back at Sakura in panic. They were stuck on what to do. Neji's methods certainly were underhanded yet an interrogation was necessary...Tenten looked like she didn't know what to do about Neji.

"Sakura we have to do this! Think about the mission. If this Naruto is the rogue ninja pretending to be Naruto, it means the real Naruto is still out there somewhere." came Ino feeling nauseous by the scene.

Sakura closed her eyes in defeat and shook her head at the ground. The corrosive sting of betrayal by comrades... by friends was intolerable. They all knew attacking comrades was undeniable treachery with no excuses in the ninja rules.

"-Try again." growled Neji. "Seven-"

"-Erm I have the nine tailed fox sealed inside me—

"-Not good enough! Everyone knows that!" roared Neji as he stabbed Naruto in the upper arm. He screamed in pain into the shocked room as blood gushed out his arm.

Kariin looked away pinching her eyes closed.

Sakura lost her breath as panicked engulfed her. She would never think something so baneful and inhumane could be carried out from one proud Leaf shinobi to another.

She struggled and squirmed against the Taka's Jugo to free herself from his clutches as she fell to the floor but he grabbed her feet. She tried kicking him but this time Sasuke himself came to pull her back up and hold her back. Sakura screamed as they harassed her. This Sasuke...he couldn't be the same person who'd saved her from the demon dog earlier...

Tears of guilt stung the eyes of Ino and Tenten who did nothing... Shikamaru remained as he was...collected yet tense from the outside.

"Six! Five! Four-

"During our first battle at our first Chunin exam in the arena you told me that you're father died willingly to protect the interests of the Leaf Village and Hyuuga clan, taking the place of your uncle in death as your uncle was the first born and therefore the leader…" he rushed out, breathing loudly and sweating.

Neji stopped counting and stared at Naruto with a kunai pointed directly at his right eye. Naruto's heart threatened to give way as he clutched his wounds and stared into the eyes of his tormentor. Sakura was trembling and felt sickly as she tried to breathe...Everyone else looked at Neji to see whether Naruto had passed the test or not...

"It's him. The real Naruto" Neji said finally backing off. It was his turn to feel the sting of his personal information exposed for everyone to hear. There was no way that something that personal he told Naruto years ago would be in the possession of a fake. A collective sigh chorused through the house.

Jugo and Sasuke let go of Sakura pushing her to the floor again as she scrambled up and ran to Naruto, pushing Neji, Shikamaru and Ino aside in fury. She could not even glance in their direction or she feared that she might kill them in all her anger.

When she got to Naruto squirming in pain and clutching his stomach to prevent further blood loss, her hand turned a bright blue-green to begin healing him.

Neji walked back to Tenten who was also trembling violently as her face went ash grey watching Neji's actions.

"How could you do that to Naruto? You're completely out of line" hissed Tenten to Neji with her voice threatening to break in anger at Neji as he walked to her.

"Listen to me, listen to me Tenten" he said trying to get closer to her and hold onto her hands but she backed away from him.

"Get away from me!" she snapped trying to push his hands away from her.

Within an instant a smack could be heard punching the air in the room as Neji slapped Tenten across the face.

The room froze. Tenten froze. The world was spinning. The Will of Fire, diminishing...

"Snap out of it!...We are all in a volatile situation and I'm doing what you bleeding hearts are too afraid to do. We're all going to get killed if you don't start acting like shinobi!" he came right up to her face with his daring eyes.

Tenten's tear stained soft brown eyes turned away from his cruelty, she was overcome by numbness as she massaged her bruised heart and he wiped off any emotion from his face.

Sakura, a healed Naruto, Shikamaru and Ino exchanged incredulous glances at each other. Neji would rather cut off his leg than assault his closest teammate, Tenten. It bred suspicion among the Leaf shinobi. Neji Hyuuga. There was something wrong with him...

"C'mon, let's keep it going, who's next? I say we try waterboarding or Chinese water torture. Torture is always an effective way of making people confess" said Suigetsu with a cheeky smile on his face hoping to use his water style ninjutsu...

The room went quiet in fear. The idea of torture was too disturbing but very possible judging by the actions of Neji. Someone had to say something... everyone knew that if they didn't speak out it would lead to quick irrational stunts again.

"Sakura's next" came Neji all of a sudden.

Sakura could feel her body giving up as she wearily pointed her kunai at Neji shakily. He did the same with everyone pointing theirs at Sakura within a blink of an eye.

"What's gotten into you? Do you sadistically enjoy bullying people?" whispered Sakura bitterly. He ignored her.

"Why her?" demanded Shikamaru.

"When I found her in the forest earlier after waking up, she was behaving incredibly strange. Not to mention that she deliberately chose not to tell me that there was a kunai thrown in my head."

Sakura noticed Sasuke and his team flinch closer to her which made her panic. She needed someone to blame and lift the fear off her.

"No. What about Ino! She was acting like a demon herself in the forest" said Sakura pointing. "When I woke up after the blast in the forest, Ino was the first person I found and she attacked me for no reason with a million shuriken."

Shikamaru remembered the kunai that had struck him in the side before he saw the demon dog.

"Stop lying Sakura!" she yelled afraid staring at all the intimidating ninja weapons; the only worse than being accused of being an imposter is not having any evidence to prove that you weren't the imposter.

"I'm not lying, there was blood on your fist that you couldn't explain and the moment I was about to hit you, you were suddenly back to normal. Very convenient" said Sakura.

"And you told me that you'd heard a voice but no one else did. I could be you" said Ino trying to find any piece of evidence to save her skin.

The betrayal was on another level.

"Guys stop it, this isn't helping, and we can't just accuse each other like this. We need an effective way to do this." said Shikamaru firmly; he began to sweat under all the pressure and intensity of the room.

"Now everyone, lower your weapons slowly." he said as he started by lowering Asuma's chakra blades with everyone following suit but never taking their eyes off each other. With one slight hesitation by Sasuke, all weapons were back in the air until they were finally all effectively put away but nobody dropped their guard. Everyone was everyone's enemy until the imposter could be eliminated from the group.

"We should rule torture out of the question. Innocent people are going to get hurt. What we need is an investigation" said Ino.

"That sounds like something the imposter would say trying to keep us from doing certain things and only doing what he wants us to do." said Neji. It's only logical that anyone hiding in a group would try to stop us from carrying out an investigation..."

Sasuke's rolled his red eyes in annoyance and stared up to fixate on the living room ceiling while the back and forthing of the Leaf ninja continued. He stared at the powerful jutsu dangling over their heads at that exact time. One that only his powerful visual jutsu could see. It was perfectly in place. The same as the one in the kitchen...He shook his head and snorted.

Kariin noticed Sasuke still had his sharingan eyes activated and now that a rogue was hiding among them, she felt guarded. She stepped slightly back from him, hoping that he wouldn't notice and take offence at her suspicion.

"Be careful Kariin. Nothing in this house is as it seems. Nothing. This is a highly controlled environment." said Sasuke.

"What do you mean?"

He didn't respond; he was too busy monitoring the genjutsu seal hanging from the roof over their heads. Both seals were hanging in the living room and in the kitchen...

The group of tense ninja moved back and walked away. Neji leaned against the wall alone and away from Tenten who'd removed herself from him; Shikamaru sat back on the couch with Ino sitting next to him, Sakura sat on a stool next to Naruto sitting on the tatami floor and Sasuke sat on the table again with his team right next to him.

"Naruto. Tell us everything you remember. You were gone for three hours. How did you find this place then?" asked Shikamaru.

"I don't know; I woke up on the steps of the patio of this house. Then a gust of wind blew me against the door and I started yelling for you guys to let me in"

Everyone took in his words and what they meant. They all knew that Naruto was nowhere near the house when they came inside.

"That means... someone must've placed you outside when we came in here." said Kariin.

Moment of silence. Shock. Sakura remembered the voice she'd heard whispering to her in the forest. She wondered if someone else could really be hiding in the forest. Or was the Kariin girl a liar like Naruto had declared.

"How is that possible? I thought the rogue ninja was among us pretending. We were all in here when we were waiting for Naruto" said Ino.

"Not all of us…" said Shikamaru looking straight at the blue-black haired ninja.

Everyone turned to look at Sasuke. He'd been the only person absent from the group when Naruto had arrived. His sharingan eyes swooped over them all.

"Well? Whose first to attack me? C'mon, Naruto? Since you've been begging me to fight you forever!" he dared with his sharingan activated. "Didn't think so!" he spat at them smug faced.

Naruto looked down; he knew that nobody was willing to pull the same stunt Neji had done on him to the most powerful shinobi of the entire group. Not even he had enough strength at that time. Sasuke remained the most invulnerable of them all. A trait which flourished suspicion among them.

"I trust Sasuke with my life. I won't turn on him ever." Jugo finally spoke.

"Don't you get it Jugo, you can't trust anyone. What if Sasuke is pretending to be the real Sasuke?" said Suigetsu looking jokingly at Sasuke who ignored him completely. His eyes darted back to the Leaf ninja.

"I would be able to tell if Sasuke was a fake, I know his chakra like the back of my hand." said Kariin

"Of course you do" taunted Suigetsu in a low drawl.

"Shut up Suigetsu!" snapped Kariin blushing and squeezing her fingers on the side of her glasses in embarrassment.

"Actually all of you should shut up. There is no longer any point of doing this. We aren't playing by anyone else's rules but the rogue ninja. He has us firmly under his grasp. Not to mention that all you Leaf ninja are acting like scared children" snapped Sasuke.

At least his word worked in stabilising the situation. Sasuke's power allowed him the privilege of unofficial authority.

**5:22 pm**

The ten hostile ninja inside the isolated house in the vast forest outside the Grass Village were on edge. For the Leaf ninja it was another long pause of going through the motions of a tedious monotonous mission. Everyone had placed their weapons away but never dropped their guard or at least made sure their weapons were within reach.

Sakura looked down at the floor unable to tell whether she could ever forgive her Leaf ninja allies for what happened to Naruto and herself...

The quiet and mysterious Jugo was staring outside the window as if he was expecting someone of his own. When a thought occurred to him. It was pathetic, watching them all torture each other the way they had. But maybe if they were at least made aware of what they were looking for, it would ease the situation...

"Sasuke, if we Taka need to look out and identify the rogue, don't we also need to know who he is and how he looks like?" said Jugo.

Sasuke looked at Shikamaru and so did the rest of the shinobi. Shikamaru looked burnt out but once again second in command Neji took the initiative.

"Tell them Sakura. They need to know" came Neji. Sakura flipped her middle finger at Neji in annoyance before lifting her head at the rest of them.

She really didn't want to hear his voice. Neji was working incredibly hard to get on her nerves while she was forcing control over her anger. Why was he the most impossible person there?

"Well this is only classified information we're telling outsiders but who cares right?" she said cynically. "This is what we have so far. Two days ago before we left the Leaf Village-"

-Naruto glanced at Sasuke-

-Lady Tsunade told us of a ninja gone rogue living here in Kusagakure, the Grass Village, one of our Allied Nations. Apparently this rogue ninja has been plaguing the village for some time now causing strange unexplained deaths among villagers. Most of them pointed out and said that he'd run into this forest as we got to the village, but wouldn't divulge any more information out of fear of being targeted."

She rummaged through her backpack to pull out a picture given to the Hokage of the Leaf, then watched them all closely hoping to pick up any strange reaction from the hidden rogue.

"This is a picture of the rogue given to us by Lady Fifth. We still don't have a name yet, not that we need it to find out who it is. But as we already know this ninja practically defines obscure." She held up the picture more to the Leaf ninja.

The unsmiling young man who appeared to be in his late twenties had long spikey dark brown hair and scratches around his neck near a bandage wrapping on his upper shoulder. He wore plain brown overalls and was working in a field in the photo. But the one thing that stood out was the look on his face. It was practically oozing embittered hatred. His extremely evil, nasty, grimace and red bloodshot eyes seeping with rage, pierced right out of the photo.

"Crap. That shinobi looks _insane_. What kind of unexplained deaths were they?" asked Suigetsu taken aback by the biting ferocity in the man's eyes.

She looked at all of them. "That's the scary part. He doesn't lay a hand on you. He makes you commit suicide."

The shocked and appalled expressions on their faces made the hidden ninja even more frightening...The Taka looked at each other. What kind of evil menace were the Leaf Village hunting...

"Nobody is quite sure how he does it, he could be using intimidation, psychological torture or even a jutsu to pressure people into taking their own lives. Literally ordinary people will be okay one minute, then next thing they'll throw themselves in a well or stab themselves. This is why we had to take extra precautionary measures, because we don't really know what we're dealing with" she said looking at the Leaf trying to hide her resentment; they acknowledged that she was talking about the poison syringe.

"The decipher core of the Leaf has identified a pattern though. According to their analysis, all the suicides were either in a body of water so drowning or by stabbing themselves as in disembowelment. Very strange" she said. She couldn't help but look at Neji; the rogue ninja was associated with stabbings...just the way he'd stabbed Naruto.

"What's that in his pocket?" asked Shikamaru, only then noticing something peculiar.

"What do you mean?" said Sakura. Everyone stared at the picture.

"There's something in his pocket that we can't see properly."

Sakura looked closely at the picture. She hadn't noticed it before Shikamaru had said anything. They'd all scanned the picture many times before leaving the Leaf Village and Sakura knew that there hadn't been anything there. It was eerie.

The big side pocket of his overall was bulging with something stuffed inside. A tiny head was sticking out with long blond hair and brown eyes.

"Strange. I never noticed that before...it...it looks like a...Barbie doll or a puppet." she said perplexed as to why such a formidable rogue ninja would pocket a kiddies doll as if it was some kind of prized possession.

It only took Kariin a few seconds for the picture to register in her head.

"Wait a second, Sasuke…" Kariin snatched the picture and straightened her glasses properly and stared intently; her face was unreadable but it made everyone tense up in suspense.

"Do you know something Kariin?" asked Jugo.

She looked at Sasuke trying to ease her shock before painfully forcing a relaxed gaze on her face.

"No. I, never mind it was nothing...I thought I recognised him but I don't, this man works as a gardener in the Grass Village. I can see by the company emblem on the chest." she whispered looking back at the group trying to be convincing. The Leaf ninja looked at each other suspiciously; she hadn't hidden herself effectively, they knew that she knew something but deliberately chose to keep mum about it.

"Then how is it that he is a ninja who became a rogue ninja if he is merely a gardener." asked Shikamaru sceptically.

"How should I know, I'm only telling you what I know, if you don't like it then shut up" she snapped. Sakura could see Kariin's body beginning to tremble slightly again; it inspired the fear in her. It was clear that they were dealing with an unknown scary power right in their midst.

"Guys, you don't think that maybe he's using some kind of voodoo doll type jutsu like a puppetmaster to control people into seppuku, do you?" whispered Tenten wondering how they would fight a power like that.

A thought clicked inside Sakura's head. "Wait, what did you just say?" she breathed.

"I just asked if you think it's possible..."

Sakura had already drifted off as her head slowly turned sideways at the word 'seppuku'. She recalled the wait for Naruto. She recalled the curiosity for reading about female ninja in a book where its contents couldn't be found. Instead there had been a haiku...

She stood up suddenly and beelined for the bookshelf.

"What's wrong Sakura? Where are you going?" asked Naruto.

She didn't respond. She didn't have the time or mind to. Her mind was busy. Her hand floated above the book 'Hide and Seek' once again before slowly touching it. No flash again. She was in the clear. All pairs of eyes focused on her as she opened the book 'Kunoichi on the Battlefield: A History of the Female Ninja' to the only writing in the entire book.

She read the same haiku again that she'd read while they were waiting for Naruto to arrive. It was that word. 'Seppuku'. There had to be a link.

"_Betrayer of mine, I will surely bury you, you do seppuku'. That wording 'do' before the word seppuku, it almost comes across as an instruction. As if it's trying to say 'you will do seppuku' after the threat made in the line 'I will surely bury you' and the word 'betrayer' could indicate that it is a matter of revenge._" she said in her head.

It didn't go unnoticed to her how quickly and easily she was able to interpret the haiku this time, now that there was some context of interpreting it. But only if there was a link of course...

Sakura bit her lip in anxiety. She _had_ to bury her anger at her Leaf comrades for the sake of the mission...

She really wanted to read it aloud for the Leaf ninja to be aware of the possible link between the haiku and the rogue ninja's method of killing. But since the rogue was actually among them, she couldn't, it might endanger her and everyone else if he found out that she was on to him. But the rogue was only one person, so how would she inform the other's without making the pretender know if she didn't know who it was...

"_Ah damn, this is so frustrating, who can I trust? This information could be crucial; I have to tell someone...but who?_" she ranted in her head.

She was only then made completely aware that everyone was still staring at her waiting for her revelation. But she couldn't say it aloud... Sakura relaxed her gaze and tried to breathe normally and calmly to display her best poker face.

"Oh sorry it was nothing. False alarm." she said hoping she fooled them. They all looked at her the same way they had looked at Kariin when she'd stated that she didn't know anything about the man in the picture. In other words, nobody believed her. She was now the new Kariin of the situation.

Her eyes shot to Sasuke. The poem sounded like a sworn revenge poem. Sasuke basically ate revenge for breakfast. She wondered whether it could be him somehow...the untouchable Mr perfect.

Naruto hugged his body tightly; a shiver had crept into his jacket from outside.

"It's freezing in here. Can't we start a fire?" he whined.

"There's no firewood in here." said Sakura.

"What about the forest outside?" said Naruto raising an eyebrow and pausing for a second...the corner of his mouth curved upwards ever so slightly while he stared at the rest of the shinobi.

Everyone stopped to stare at him after what he'd said. The dark blizzard saturated forest. Nobody was willing to venture into such an ungodly place. Naruto neutralised his face.

"Don't tell me you're afraid of the storm or the rogue? There is no rogue. Trust me" he said with a hint of dare.

Silence.

Sakura also felt goosebumps forming on her icy skin as the wind found itself through the gaps in the wood and crept into any opening of her clothing it could find. She shivered at the cold.

"I'll go. I can practically tip over a tree with my fist and carry it back in no time." she said in the momentary silence, she'd only realised how much she wanted an escapism and a distraction from the tense environment of the house, if only for a while.

"What the hell is wrong with you? Didn't we just conclude that going into that forest would expose our location? And there could be an opportunity at any moment for an attack-

"Shut up Neji Hyuuga! I don't care what you have to say anymore okay? I've already decided that I'm going." she snapped sourly already getting up.

"But Sakura-"protested Naruto.

"-You can't go by yourself. Someone from our Taka team should also accompany you to balance it out." said Kariin.

"Are you stupid-?" she winced.

Her voice had just been raised up slightly in fear. There was no chance in hell she would go into the forest with people she didn't know with a rogue hiding among them.

"Suigetsu should go since he has Zabuza's blade so he can cut down any tree quickly as well" said Sasuke. Suigetsu grunted at the prospect of going outside.

Sakura jerked her head back in surprise. That's where that blade was from.

"Zabuza's blade. Where did you get that?"

Sasuke looked at his former team mates in the moment. Sakura and Naruto both remembered when they'd still been a team; all three of them and their legendary sensei had been placed on the mission that led them to Zabuza...as a team.

"I'll go too. Sasuke, come with us as well." pleaded Naruto. Sasuke couldn't tell whether Naruto was talking about going outside to collect wood or going back to the Leaf Village as always with him...that annoying chancer Naruto...

"No, you'll just get in the way; you wouldn't be of any use. I'll go but only with Sakura and Suigetsu." said Sasuke. "I can use my fire jutsu as a light source"

The Leaf ninja just looked at each other; the idea of leaving two unknown members of team Taka alone in the forest with Sakura made them uneasy.

Sakura exchanged resentful glances with Neji as Suigetsu and Sasuke come along with her. She felt it in her heart; it had to be him, there was no doubt in her mind. She just needed a way of swaying Sasuke and Suigetsu to think the same way and try to expose him or at least find out who they were suspecting. At least going outside was a way of talking privately...but then again...

Sakura looked at Sasuke; he was way too laid back for being in such a precarious situation, and then the relatively unknown Taka guy Suigetsu with Zabuza's blade, who just didn't seem to be up for anything. She wondered if their unaffected and removed attitudes were something to worry about.

She looked back at Naruto for reassurance who gave an unreadable smile that didn't quite connect to his usually shiny bright eyes at her.

Suigetsu waited for Sasuke to get to the door and exchanged a grin with him.

**5:34 pm**

Suigetsu opened the door with great effort against the force of the furious storm while Sasuke and Sakura followed behind him. The minute they reach outside they were immediately being blown backwards by the strong winds.

Sasuke clicked his fingers and his palm was lit up by small fire snaking upwards. It had to have some protective covering provided by his fire style jutsu because the strong winds were unable to blow it out.

"Stay behind me." said Sasuke walking forward with the light.

The entire patio area and down the stairs were smothered in darkness. Sakura had been, until then, unaware of how frightened she was, she remembered the unidentified voice that had echoed past her in the forest during the day...then the unnerving picture of the cruel looking rogue ninja burned into her memory floated back into mind as she walked too closely to Sasuke wanting to hold onto this Akatsuki cloak.

_Seppuku...suicide...he doesn't lay a hand on you...drownings...stabbings..._

Sasuke, holding a flame in his hand with Sakura and Suigetsu behind him, made it to the white forest and stopped at the tree nearest them. Sasuke couldn't see past the two rows of trees in front of them. Sakura hated the forest with every fibre of her being. It was always too quiet...too quiet...

"Wow, can't actually believe that Sasuke was actually a part of your ninja team. Doesn't suit him" said Suigetsu to Sakura.

"Shut up Suigetsu." said both Sakura and Sasuke.

"This should be far enough...Well get going Sakura" said Sasuke impatiently. She glared at him wind whipped before focusing her chakra in her fist and striking the tree which came down with a crashing boom in the quiet forest.

A bark echoed in the distance.

Sakura involuntarily jumped towards Sasuke while Sasuke and Suigetsu's heads shot towards the deeper black forest...

Sakura couldn't tell whether it was a person, or a dog...but remembered the giant black oni dog coming from somewhere in the forest. Shikamaru had said that he'd found it regular sized before it began growing...she took a huge gulp.

Sasuke and Suigetsu waited...five seconds...then relaxed their alertness. Nothing came.

"Now Suigetsu" yelled Sasuke.

Sakura jolted and whipped around at Suigetsu who swung his executioner's blade at her...

An ambush...

It was him...how could she not have seen it coming...

She readied herself to block the blade but it swung past her and sliced through the tree trunk.

Sakura breathed hard...it had been a misunderstanding...she dropped to her knees in torment...

"Wha? You thought I was aiming for you. Ha! Sasuke she thinks it's me! This Leaf ninja girl thinks I'm the rogue. She's clueless." he chuckled.

Sasuke and Suigetsu exchanged amused glances. Sakura wanted to punch the lights out of them both. But it gave her an opportunity to probe their suspicions.

"So then if it's not you then who do you think it is?"

"There's only three possibilities." said Sasuke. She stared up at Sasuke intensely, begging for his predictions.

"Neji. Naruto. Or me..." said Sasuke eyeing Suigetsu. "Those are the only logical options."

Sakura stared at him head aslant with the wild wind blowing her hair all around her face. Naming himself as a suspect...was he being serious...was he hinting...Was it some kind of joke...but what about the whole Naruto bit.

"Neji Hyuuga cleared Naruto from being a suspect-

"-That's only because Neji Hyuuga is a suspect himself..." interrupted Sasuke. Sakura looked at him feeling quite satisfied; it was just what she was aiming to find out. She was not the only one who suspected Neji. But the question was...what were they going to do about it...

"Well I guess judging by your freak out right now it could also be...Suigetsu." he said as Suigetsu bared his shark teeth in mock seriousness.

"Could you guys take this a little more seriously? You're starting to freak me out here" said Sakura although admittedly to herself, their lax attitude was quite infectious.

"There _is nothing_ serious about this situation. Some psychopathic rogue ninja is pretending to be one of us while we're all forced under the same shelter and can't trust each other? It's actually quite funny." smirked Suigetsu.

"Actually this rogue ninja isn't just any motiveless psychopath. Judging by some information I received, he's out for revenge" she said remembering the poem she'd read about seppuku and the keyword 'betrayers' which she kept to herself. "Sounds quite familiar doesn't it? Revenge?"

Suigetsu and Sasuke smiled at each other.

"So you are keeping secrets from us, aren't you?" asked Sasuke piling wood into Suigetsu's hands.

"We're all keeping secrets from each other, and don't act like you didn't know it...Oh yeah by the way Sasuke, please remind me that I owe you an ass kicking later after you stopped me from helping Naruto. I don't allow just anyone to touch me like that." she teased helping him pile wood into his Taka teammate's hands.

She caught a glimpse of his warm onyx eyes as she bent over to retrieve the wood. The freezing temperatures of the snowstorm could not douse the warmth igniting inside her. Sasuke was even more perfect up close. It had been so long...

"I guess it's true what they say about Konohan kunoichi being excessively feisty." She's feisty this one, isn't she?" came Suigetsu.

"How should I know? I'm pretending to be Sasuke of the Taka remember?" he said raising an eyebrow.

Sakura shook her head and smiled slightly; even in the dire forest riddled with malevolence, Sasuke was a charmer even in the worst circumstances...Sasuke with his cute devilish smile and shapely eyes reminding her of her days as a Genin...

The light hearted moment ended. All three ninja realised at the same time that their voices had become louder...

The brutal raging wind and noise of the snowstorm was completely wiped out and replaced by absolute silence surrounding them...

It became too quiet...

Sakura stood up and looked around alarmed at the dark forest with Sasuke and Suigetsu on high alert.

A faint squeaking rusty noise came at them from no particular place.

Squeak...squeak...squeak...

Sasuke grabbed the hilt of his kunai with his free hand while they searched around. Sakura glued herself to the other two ninja.

A strong bright light turned on behind them...

All three ninja stiffened immediately. It wasn't coming from Sasuke's flame...They were supposed to be the only ones in the entire forest...

_Seppuku...suicide...he doesn't lay a hand on you...drownings...stabbings..._

"Sssassuuke..." Sakura whispered turning around slowly...

Sasuke whipped around along with Suigetsu.

The missing lantern, Sakura noticed...

The silhouette of someone holding the missing lantern was visible, coming from the steps of the patio of the house...

Sakura tried to scream but her voice froze in her throat...

"Quickly, let's move" Sasuke says to the both of them.

"What about the wood?" hissed Suigetsu.

"Abandon it!" said Sakura already running. Suigetsu followed closely behind and they ran as fast as possible to get to the house.

The closer they got to the house, they more the silhouette would disappear until it had completely vanished from sight as they arrived at the door...

**6:03pm**

Sakura burst inside the door of the house. She pulled out two kunai in both hands and held them up at the rest of the ninja taken by surprise. Her patience had reached boiling point.

"Okay, who was it. Who just left this house right now?" she demanded as Sasuke and Suigetsu arrived behind her.

Tenten looked apprehensively at Neji then back to Sakura not aware of what was going on.

"Well, Neji did but-

Sakura had already gained on him weapons drawn; she should've guessed. As far as she was concerned, Neji was the biggest public enemy. "Where did you just go?"

"I should be asking you the same thing when you left me in the forest saying that you needed to relieve yourself earlier." said Neji.

"I already told you I don't know what you're talking about. Now answer my question" she snarled.

"Why do you have such a problem with me?" he asked head slightly askew.

"How dare you leave this place by yourself especially when three of us were already outside! You know what the situation is!" she yelled angrily at Neji.

"So what, do you want someone to accompany me everywhere I go?" he asked incredulously.

Tenten didn't like the way Sakura pointed her two kunai at him like that. Sakura had fantastic strength in both hands that could damage him.

"What's wrong now?" asked Shikamaru feeling jaded from the couch.

"We just saw someone or something heading into this house from outside, with the missing lantern I saw earlier, when we were returning with the wood. So we had to leave it behind to try and stop the imposter from pulling any stunts." She said her eyes locked on Neji.

"And you think it was me?" asked Neji. Her non response confirmed his question.

"Relax Sakura. There's no proof that it was him just because he was outside alone." came Tenten.

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME!" she roared, spewing all the anger and fear and frustration out of her voice. All she wanted to do was cut him as she glared into his challenging light eyes.

"There was no proof that Naruto was the rogue just because he was alone outside yet Neji insisted that we tear Naruto to pieces!" she yelled. She could feel the hot angry tears forming at the bottom of her eyelid when staring at Neji's smug face.

"I don't have to disclose anything to you. Now lower your weapon." said Neji crossing his arms.

"Why not? If you don't have anything to hide? "I'm so sick of this rouge ninja thing. We should just set up our own tests and interrogate him seeing as he won't tell us where he's been."

"If you really have to know, thought I heard something outside, so I went to investigate. But I don't see any point of telling you seeing that you won't believe me either way. You have some kind of grudge against me." he said blankly.

He was spot on. Sakura didn't believe him for a second. Neji saw it in her face. Tenten stepped in front of him in defensive mode.

"What the hell Tenten, step aside, what if he's the rogue? He's been acting strangely and you know it! The real Neji would never hurt you or Naruto." said Sakura.

"This is different! He's my only teammate here. You also have reserve loyalty to your own team Kakashi teammate" said Tenten.

"Everyone stop it!" said Shikamaru coming between the two groups.

"Can't you see what's going on here? All our paranoia and frustrations have made us turn on each other. There is no team Kakashi, team Guy or team Asuma here. Now everyone lower your weapons! Do it now or I'll have to report treachery on all of your reports of this mission when we get back to the Leaf. Do you understand?"

Neji. Sakura. Tenten. Nobody moved for a while but continued to stare each other down taking in Shikamaru's threats. The seeds of embittered resentment had been sown between the both of them. Neji and Sakura. Dare they think it...enemies for now... It was funny how things could change so quickly.

Finally Sakura shook her head at Neji then threw both her kunai at the wall with great force that it lodged itself into the wooden wall, almost breaking through, and then she lowered her arm.

Tenten was still trying to calm down. She couldn't tolerate anyone disrespecting Neji. But the painful truth of her words burned her inside; Neji was being far more brazen and aggressive than usual, especially when he'd hit her...but her confused mind refused to accept that he might be..._him_ after all...No not until she had solid proof...

Fear and confusion grappled its finger on the trigger, waiting...

Neji slowly lowered his guard. "Really this is hardly professional".

With one swift movement, Sasuke was behind Neji placing his unstoppable katana under his chin. Tenten, Shikamaru, Ino whipped around.

"Just like Jugo said earlier, we don't take orders from Leaf ninja. It's within our own interest to find the rogue ninja and eliminate him" he said backing up while Tenten and the rest of the room watched him unblinking. Neji was highly suspicious.

Neji took a moment to breathe before...All hell broke loose.

Neji spun around, flicking Sasuke's katana away from under his chin and aimed his gentle fist hand at Sasuke. Sasuke blocked his hands with his katana.

Tenten was about to run into the battle to help Neji but Sakura yanked her backwards by her stomach; it was deja vu for her. Tenten yelled out in frustration and pulled out her bow staff and swung it at Sakura behind her, who fell to her knees and ducked as the long thin pole glided past her face and threatened to skewer her. Then Sakura shoved Tenten forward who was about to crash into Neji but he turned around just in time, thanks to his visual byakugan's almost full circle view, and caught her in one hand.

After catching Tenten, the sheer force of his air palm jutsu slammed into Sakura and she flew backwards. Naruto jumped up; he tried so gather up some chakra in his palm but he fell to the floor clutching his head in agony and emitted a scream of terror...Suigetsu and Jugo after being taken aback by Naruto's collapse ran to aid Sasuke fighting Neji but it wasn't necessary.

Even as Neji attacked him again, Sasuke was untouchable...his now activated sharingan anticipating all of Neji's strikes to his body. Neji began rotating rapidly in response to Sasuke's sharingan power. Sakura got up and tripped Neji and he fell forwards with the tip of Sasuke's sword an inch from his face as the room began to blink a bright blue coming from Sasuke's katana.

Sakura was about to get up from the trip but Tenten grabbed her arm pulling her forwards to strike her... but Sakura was ready for it; she balled up her fist and shot straight for Tenten's face...

Until her entire body froze...but it wasn't just her...

Everyone was paralysed.

Sasuke with his chidori almost inching closer to Neji's face and Tenten about to strike Sakura and vice versa...nobody could move at all.

Sakura's eyes peered down at the ground and noticed that their shadows had been completely hijacked.

Shikamaru was standing behind them all with the handsign of the shadow possession jutsu created using the shadows created by the candlelight. He looked livid as he and Ino synced both their shadows to create a wider range and restrain them all.

"Do any of you have any idea what you have done...All of you Leaf ninja have compromised this mission. Sakura, did you even stop to realise that you were actually fighting your comrades and aiding people who are affiliated with the Akatsuki, the very same people who are after Naruto and who _killed Asuma sensei. _Why do you all insist on making this situation worse than it is?"

Sakura had not even thought about it...she had been blinded by fury at Neji and paranoia of the rogue ninja situation. She had been fighting Leaf shinobi on the side of enemies... She stared into Neji's unapologetic eyes...anger burned her insides...

"Step away from each other as I let go of my shadow possession jutsu. Sakura and Neji, one more move from you two and I'll have no choice now but to report you as instigators of infighting on this mission when we get back to the Leaf Village and I file this mission. Do you really want that? Probation or suspension?" he warned.

Shikamaru and Ino let go of their shadow possession and watched them all like a military sergeant, waiting for anyone to defy him and paralysed on the spot. Ino stared at Shikamaru concerned... Shikamaru was never one to be preachy but he was buckling under pressure; they could not afford any divisions at that time within their Leaf ninja team.

Jugo stood watching silently arms folded. He watched the Taka and Leaf as silently as always. All he had to do was wait. He just needed the right opportunity. He needed to wait…

Sakura growled in anger again as she walked away. Distraction...She needed a distraction before she couldn't resist the temptation of wanting to pound Neji. There had to be a way of exposing him before he hurt one of them...the rogue.

Walking away from the scene, her eyes floated towards the bookshelf at the corner of her eye...that bookshelf... it had to have some kind of significance to the rogue ninja. To her, finding out more about the rogue ninja was the only way to confirm her suspicion of Neji by figuring out any motions, gestures or references he would accidently slip out. Those books had to be clues...Just like the poem about seppuku.

She casually walked over to the bookshelf so she didn't catch the attention of all the high alert ninja in the room. The other book that she'd decided not to read last time was the book entitled 'White Lotus'. She slipped it out of its place on the shelf and flipped to the first page:

**_Changes in the Wind:_**

_My gentle child_

_With a gentle soul _

_Blowing in the gentle breeze_

_What powers are these_

_The _**imitation** _of bodies _

_The light in your eyes _

_I see through your disguise_

_A fear of the scourge_

_Hide until its safe to emerge _

_You are buried deep _

_For now go to sleep_

Sakura squinted her eyes at the first thing she noticed: someone had crossed out a word. 'Imitation'. Why would someone want to do that...perhaps it gave too much away..._The imitation of bodies, I see through your disguise..._Bingo, she thought.

That had to be written about the rogue ninja, it was practically screaming at her. The Kariin girl on team Taka had told them that the rogue ninja was somehow blending and disguising himself in, pretending to be one of them. She smiled to herself, the clue was vital. It proved that Kariin was not lying. She read the rest of the poem again...

_A fear of the scourge, hide until its safe to emerge..._Sakura looked away pensively. If the poem was about the rogue ninja, then it meant that the rogue ninja was impersonating someone because he was afraid of something bringing about death and misery in the village which didn't make any sense to her. How could someone with such an atrocious power such as making people kill themselves have anything to fear, he was more of a scourge himself...Also the lines '_you are buried deep, for now go to sleep' _appeared to be talking about someone who had died. Not to mention that the rogue ninja was not a 'gentle child'.

She sighed in frustration; it was incredibly confusing. She'd felt so close to finding out something tangible that she could use for exposing him among them. If only she could find out the rogue ninja's name, she would be able to link the possible clues in the books with him...

As per standard procedure for her now, she looked down at the bottom of the poem looking for the author's name but once again just like previous books it didn't have a name.

She flipped the pages and saw none of the other poems and haiku had names. She closed the book and opened the front: Her heart skipped a beat in excitement... finally it had something written on it to reveal where it came from.

_This book is the property of Namiko Kamakura for use by Kamakura Funeral Service._

_All right's reserved._

_Ashikaga House of Publishing _

_Kamakura Funeral Services. _

_3221 Chushingura Street _

_Grass Village: Kusagakure_

The first thing that jumped at her was the 'Kamakura Funeral Services'. So the book was used at funerals and the owner Namiko Kamakura was a funeral poet... She somehow found it quite sweet in a creepy and sad sort of way.

Namiko Kamakura...Kamakura. Kamakura. Sakura furrowed her brows trying to think where she had heard that name before. It was at the tip of her tongue but she couldn't put her finger on it...

"Namiko Kamakura, huh?" she said aloud.

"Huh? Did you say something?" asked Naruto coming to stand next to her by the bookshelf. She'd paused for a second remembering what Sasuke had said to her in the forest but...Naruto had passed the test with Neji so he was not a suspect anymore. Neji was now the biggest culprit.

"Yeah, I just said Namiko Kamakura, the owner of this book. The name is written in this book along with a publisher. But I can't exactly remember where I know that name from"

"It's the family name that you saw written on the house remember, before we came inside here" said Naruto.

"Oh yes that's right. So I guess then it means that this person, Namiko Kamakura was or is still living here and wrote at least this book. But this part 'Kamakura Funeral Services.' I think the family that owns this house ran a funeral business. "

"Wow. That's kinda awesome isn't it?"

"Naruto, you're such a knucklehead. As if this forested area isn't creepy enough, now there's a chance that this house is owned by people who deal with the dead. I just wish there was a way of relaying this information to everyone else without telling the imposter somehow"

"Don't tell me that you believe that Taka girl. She's lying"

"No she's not. Not this time. If we dismiss this all as a lie, we could end up going back to the Grass Village or worse yet, to the Leaf Village with a dangerous imposter bent on wreaking havoc on people. By then it would already be too late"

Naruto smiled a bright smile. "Is there a picture of her? Namiko Kamakura?" he asked with his eyes lighting up.

"No. There's nothing else about her"

"So where is she now then?" he asked with his voice going blank.

"It doesn't say..." she shook her head.

"Sakura, Naruto we're calling it a day for now. Let's get some rest while we wait for the storm to ease up. Tomorrow we're going to have no choice but to find out who the rogue is. But our way, of course" came Shikamaru from the couch as Ino, Tenten and Neji prepared their sleeping mats on the tatami floor.

"Who's going to watch over us?" she asked feeling uneasy at the idea of sleeping while a dangerous man hid among them.

"I will. Along with Sasuke who will watch his Taka team" said Shikamaru.

They laid out there sleeping mats on the floor and Shikamaru spread himself on the couch. Staring at the Taka huddled around each other...

**6:24pm**

Ino slid her tired body into her sleeping bag and looked up at Shikamaru's silhouette watching over them from the couch in the darkness and smiled to herself, then drifted away...

…_Ino's eyes rolled to the back of her head; she needed to control herself. Anger was tearing her apart; she was shaking, spitting with outrage. The betrayers had arrived for her again. She wasn't going to stand for it anymore. She looked down and saw her one hand covered in blood. She was still holding onto the kunai knife she'd stuck inside the head of the dark haired ninja with the real pretty dark hair lying unconscious in the snow… This was not her usual form of killing. She was about to stick the knife in further but the pink haired girl began stirring. She wasn't ready for anyone to wake yet... her..._

_...The house she knew all too well...Ino realised that she'd needed to go wash her hands of the blood so she got up to go to the bathroom tip toeing quietly. After she opened the tap, she washed her hands. To her annoyance she realised that the water wasn't draining but remained in a pool in the basin. The drain was probably blocked but it was too dark and late for her to do anything about it. She closed the tap with an echoing squeak. She looked up at her reflection in the mirror. And saw..._

_Someone's reflection behind her… _

_Her heart almost jumped out her body when she saw Sasuke with his red eyes standing behind her in the mirror. She jolted and gasped in fright when she turned to him. He'd been far too quiet for her to detect him._

"_Dammit Sasuke don't scare me like that. Ninja and their silence…" she breathed trying to calm down. Only then she'd remembered; he wasn't a Leaf ninja anymore, he was an enemy. After realising with shock she stared at him. But he wasn't moving; he didn't say anything to her or look away. He just stood staring blankly at her. She stared at him creeped out. He mindlessly walked up to her and grabbed her throat. She screamed but nothing came out. He pushed her head backwards by her throat and threw her head in the pool of water in the basin where she'd washed her hands. Before she knew it...he would've drowned her…_

Ino jolted up from her sleeping bag and covered her mouth to prevent herself from screaming. She breathed heavily and was sweating profusely. She looked down at her hands in horror. They were as clean as she remembered. No blood. But the dream...it had been her all along...the thought...she would never hurt another Leaf shinobi...she didn't even remember stabbing him, or having any of the thoughts in the dream... or memory...But it was more than just a dream.

It was true. He really was among them. The bad dream had to have been perpetuated by the rogue ninja, she knew it. But it could only mean one thing

Tapping into her mind to make her see what he wanted...

Genjutsu.

A thought crept into her mind. If the rogue killed people by suicides that included stabbing themselves and...drowning...she had almost been drowned in the dream...none of the Leaf ninja were water type shinobi but she didn't know whether one of the Taka members was a water type shinobi...it _had_ to be a water type shinobi controlling the water...

Unable to sleep, she got up carefully so as to not wake anyone up and tip toed to the kitchen ironically, for a glass of water.

After drinking water and calming down she placed the glass back into the sink. She took one breath before hearing something sliding against wood. Coming from the living room.

She walked out the kitchen and stared frightened at the bathroom door opening by itself on the opposite side of the room. It was completely dark in the bathroom and it could be a trap to lure her, after all she was the one who'd had the dream of the bathroom implanted in her mind. Her anxiety mixed in with shinobi determination unsettled her mind as she didn't know what to do. Waking the others? No she couldn't...everyone was exhausted...

She walked quietly and slowly in the dark and when she reached the sliding panel door, she pulled out a kunai and placed it in her hand…Until someone behind her slapped their hand over her mouth, muzzling her.

Sasuke Uchiha.

Ino's panic stricken mind raced back to the dream she'd just had. Was it possible that it had been real or some sort of premonition...he wanted to kill her? Was Sasuke the rogue ninja? She stood no chance...

She tried screaming and fighting him off by stabbing his hand with her kunai but he turned her around. She noticed that his sharingan was not turned on.

He let go of her mouth and placed his index finger over her lips to indicate that she must be quiet but she wasn't having any of it-she was too freaked out.

"Did you just place a genjutsu on me?" she blurted out wide eyed.

"What? Be quiet. There is someone or something in that bathroom." hissed Sasuke.

"No. I want to know whether you used those crazy eyes of yours to place a genjutsu against me."

"You can see that my sharingan is not activated! besides you have to look into my eyes for it to work. Why are you so bothered anyway?" he whispered loudly.

She shook her head at him, lost for words.

She took a step back...

-Splash-

Ino recognised the sound of water under her feet. She looked down along with Sasuke. There was a pool of water on the floor... it was streaming from the bathroom.

Ino struggled to come to terms with everything. Her mind was spinning.

Had it been a nightmare or reality. Al the elements from her nightmare were present. Sasuke. Water from a blocked pipe in the bathroom.

She backed away slowly from a confused looking Sasuke.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked. She stared blankly at him. She just wanted to run away. Her legs carried her away from Sasuke and the bathroom...back to her sleeping mat.

Sakura heard Ino return from the kitchen as she lay down staring at the ceiling trying to understand the events of the day. Their mission to assassinate the rogue ninja of the Grass Village had to be the most trying in every aspect. All their misfortune at not finding the rogue was exacerbated by the snowstorm and being stuck in a house with the Taka and the rogue himself...She wondered how long it would take them to finish the mission while they waited for the outside storm to calm down...

She stared at the silhouettes of the group of ninja in the dark thinking where the Kamakura's could be and whether they would return anytime soon, demanding the freeloaders off their property. She stared at the wall...and realised something occurring in her head when she thought about the family who owned the house... The unexplained was far from over, in fact, it had only just begun...

Her eyes grew wide as she realised.

How had Naruto known that she'd seen the Kamakura surname on the wall outside the house...when he hadn't arrived yet...

**A/N**: Okay so my sister's BEEN guessing who it is. I thought it was pretty obvious but...


	4. Chapter 4: hide and Seek

**Chapter 4: hide and Seek**

**A/N: Okay, so there's a lot of dialogue here because the characters have to discuss and figure things out...I tried shortening it but there's so much content to get through...**

**6:12 am**

Shikamaru's weary almond eyes popped open and blinked twice to adjust his eyes to the dim light. He took a moment to ponder what the situation was. He remembered dispiritedly; it was the second day of their mission, or rather and more consequentially, the second day of their entrapment in the isolated house by the blizzard and of course, their hunt for the bogus proxy who had embedded himself within their own ninja teams.

He lazily stared at the nothingness of the white ceiling as numb dread lulled over the quiet house. He didn't remember falling asleep as he lay on the couch. So much for being a night watchman... he kicked himself internally; allowing such a complicated mission to go on for two days was overbearing.

He sat up and stretched his stiff joints and avoided looking at the floor of ninja. He wasn't ready for all the paranoia and suspicion to begin in his head...he rather unwillingly pulled his heavy body off the couch and walked over to the small rectangular windows bordered by dark thick wood.

A small smile of gratitude broke the smooth even surface of his skin as he saw the gradually pacifying wind appeasing the ever slowing trickle of snow gently falling on the over saturated white forest. The storm was finally calming down. He breathed a sigh of relief as he reckoned that if the slowing of the storm persisted, and if they were lucky, they could make it back to Grass Village within a couple of hours.

But in that moment of sudden internal celebration he realised that the Leaf faced another dilemma. If the Taka found out that the storm was dissipating, they could decide to leave as they wouldn't have any reason to be at that house anymore and they as the Leaf wouldn't be able to stop them. If one of them was the rogue, then he would get away and their mission would be a complete fail. Shikamaru knew at that second that the pressure was on: it couldn't be prolonged anymore; they had to find out who it was. Today before the Taka decide to leave.

He walked away from the window, loosening his messy hair then retying it back into its tight spikey ponytail after he smoothed and straightened it. Since the unavoidable situation couldn't be ignored forever...the corner of his eye caught his long-time friend and partner sitting on the tatami matted floor, knees drawn up into her chest with her head buried in her hands.

"Ino, are you okay?" he asked walking up to her and crouching down. She looked up at his serious and concerned eyes; she wanted more than anything to tell someone especially Shikamaru, whom she trusted the most, about the terrible dream or memory haunting her, where she was almost drowned by 'Sasuke'...and that she'd almost killed Neji...but she was at her wit's end. She didn't quite understand what had happened to her. And what if he accused her of being the rogue because of the whole Neji bit...

"Yeah I'm fine." she whispered patting his shoulder. Shikamaru could see that she was just trying to dismiss the fear and uncertainty in her light blue eyes. He touched her hand patting her shoulder, reassuring her. It was all the more crucial to end everything once and for all.

Shikamaru stood back up and heard murmurings coming from the kitchen-

-Splash-

He looked down on his way to the kitchen. There was a trail of water streaming from the bathroom through the living room all the way to the kitchen, wetting the entire floor...the mini flood must've been there all night...

As he got to the Kitchen, Sasuke and Suigetsu were talking silently in the one corner while Sakura was on the opposite side of the kitchen, whereas Tenten was standing with elbows on the counter and Neji was standing by the door frame. It was too obvious for the eyes to see. All three Leaf ninja were standing separately and didn't even acknowledge each other. Shikamaru's worst fears were evidently true; their ninja team was divided which had been exacerbated by and last nights' brawl.

"Suigetsu, what's with all the water on this floor? Go and find whatever pipe has burst and fix it. I saw it coming from the bathroom last night." said Sasuke pulling out his katana to sharpen it with a knife sharpener.

Shikamaru exchanged glances with Sasuke as he walked, or more like splashed, passed him and stopped; for one scary moment it appeared like Sasuke was about to blaze lightning through the water to electrocute him, making him as the rogue seem scarier...

Suigetsu deformed himself from a human into a formless mound then assimilated into the water and swam, travelling in his formless state to find the source of the leak. Neji, Tenten, Shikamaru and Sakura eyed him suspiciously. They had no idea that he was a water type shinobi...

Sakura stood where she was. Head in outer space. Paranoia engulfing her. Her mind, welcomed in disturbia. Naruto. Neji. Neji. Naruto. Blank stares. Shifty eyes. Fake smiles. Pretentiousness. Her psyche was in a dizzying state.

"Hey Sasuke, come over here for a sec." said Suigetsu swimming in the flooded pool of water as Sasuke slid his katana back into its shell and he left the kitchen to follow him.

"What is it Suigetsu?" he whispered impatiently as they rounded the corner.

"This water, you said that it was coming from the bathroom but I can't find the source. It's really coming from...I don't know, the sky probably" he remarked confused.

Sasuke sighed in annoyance at all the childish antics. "Just forget it. It's the controlled environment again." he said as they both walked back to Kariin and Jugo.

"Tenten, can I talk to you privately?" asked Neji taking a cue from Suigetsu.

Tenten reluctantly walked out with Neji which left Shikamaru alone in the kitchen with Sakura.

"What do you want?" she said flatly yet glad that he'd finally approached her to apologise like she'd been waiting. He led her to the very corner of the living room.

"Listen. Sasuke Uchiha is the rogue ninja" he declared quietly to her arrogantly, placing his arm over her shoulder confidently and pulling her closer. Tenten recoiled at his audacity.

"What? How do you know that for sure?" she said turning away from him; she realised painfully that he hadn't come to apologise for what he did after all.

"Because Naruto is in the clear and I know that I'm not the rogue, so it can only be him. We haven't had a chance to interrogate him out of fear of being attacked by his astronomically powerful eyes but we can't use that as an excuse anymore. I have a plan. Shikamaru can use his shadow possession jutsu to freeze him just like last night. That way we can get close to him and use one of Sakura's anaesthetic needles to paralyse his body and pounce-

"-Boy that really does sound like a great plan Neji, it's too bad that I'm just not interested because you haven't proven to _me_ that you're not the rogue yet..." she sassed with eyebrows drawn as she walked away. She hated doing that to him but she needed to teach him a lesson on respect.

"Wait, Tenten where are you going? This could be our last chance to bag the rogue."

"The rogue, the rogue, the rogue. Is that all you care about now? Was the rogue the person who undeserving defended you by fighting comrades even though they were mistreated?" she said her heart pounding.

"Of course not...why are you looking at me like..." he trailed off staring into her eyes wanting to elaborate further but he just didn't know how.

"Why do you think? You're so clueless" she whined. She waited for him to say it. 'I care about you and I'm sorry'...but it never came.

She turned and walked away from him as he ran his fingers through his head. Thinking...trying to understand...

Back in the kitchen...Sakura stared at Shikamaru being the only one in the kitchen with her. She contemplated going up to him and telling him about the incident that happened the previous night with Naruto. He might be willing to help her with an explanation because of his genius. But before she could act on her thoughts Shikamaru had just opened one of the kitchen cabinet's absent-mindedly, forgetting that they were empty the last time they had checked...

"Sakura!" He hissed so that no one else would overhear from the living room. She looked over to him.

"Come look at this" he opened the cupboard. As she walked over to him she also saw what was not supposed to be there...

A Plate. A single chipped plate with cracks on its smooth glass. Right next to it a silver antique spoon, bent and fragmented. Then right next to it a single cup appearing a moment away from cracking. There was nothing else.

"What the-how did these get here?" asked Sakura as Shikamaru shook his head "Unfortunately it doesn't end there, look" he said as he opened up more cabinets. Sakura followed suit.

"Hey, there's exactly that same set of broken dishes in here...and here again, here as well" she said furiously prying open the cupboards with Shikamaru.

"That's it. That's all of them...how many was that. I counted eleven." said Sakura.

The significance of what she'd just said appeared in the way he stared at her pensively. "Sakura, do you notice anything about that?"

She looked at him until she noticed it too. She gasped.

"I know; there are exactly eleven dishes here, which is one more than the same amount of people we have in this house." said Shikamaru. Sakura tried to think about the relevance of plates... spoons...cups...plates, spoons, cups...Both her and Shikamaru realised at the same time as their eyes grew wide.

"The…the poem! The poem in the book I read, remember?" she gasped.

"Yeah, that very vague one you showed me when we were waiting for Naruto" he nodded.

Sakura ran back to the bookshelf and pulled out the book she'd read the previous day entitled 'Broken Pieces of Silver' then ran back to Shikamaru in the kitchen.

"Look here; it was the only piece of writing in this book, remember? It says in poetry form 'Ereben spoon, ereben cups, ereben plates, no one eating, no knife allowed..."But I wonder what 'ereben' means?" she said.

Shikamaru thought, what could the significance of that word be...it had to be a reference to either the _type_ of dishes or the _number_ of dishes...he smirked at her when the simplicity dawned on him...

"That word 'ereben', it's a language matter. There is no pronunciation of the letters 'l' or 'v' in the Japanese language, so the letters 'r' and 'b' are substituted to pronounce those sounds. So if we replace 'r' with 'l' and 'b' with 'v', in the word 'ereben'...you land up with...eleven! The same number of dishes." he said placing his hands in his pocket.

No amount of appreciation could ever describe how thankful she was that Shikamaru was a genius. Especially as she considered how much she'd tried interpreting other poems in the books and getting stuck. She should've approached him sooner.

"You're brilliant Shikamaru. Do you think the rogue is trying to send us a subliminal message? Maybe reminding us that there are really eleven of us here as he's still hiding among us? Adding one more of these dishes than they are people to represent all ten of us Leaf and Taka ninja plus him?"

Shikamaru shook his head slowly "I can't be sure because of what you said remember, you told me this book was dated a year ago. These dishes, although aren't in the right condition for use, are just like the candles and the box of matches. Someone must've placed them here without us knowing. It's too much of a coincidence. Sasuke was right." he said.

"About what?"

They both turned around to see Sasuke standing behind them looking suspiciously at them. They didn't respond to him but merely looked his way. Sakura darted her eyes around the kitchen realising that she and Shikamaru were lucky that they'd closed all the cabinet doors.

"And you Leaf ninja think that we Taka are suspicious yet you're the ones talking secretly amongst each other. Only an idiot wouldn't notice the two of you talking silently alone here. Now what was I right about?" Well?"

Sakura held the 'Broken Pieces of Silver' book towards her chest from the front cover concealing the title from him.

"I'm not sure if we can trust you Sasuke" said Sakura honestly. Shikamaru couldn't've said it better himself.

"That's too bad. This temporary alliance is over if you're not willing to disclose information"

"You're also one to talk. What about that _girl _on your team? She didn't want to disclose any information to us as well. We could see that she wasn't being honest about not knowing anything about the rogue from the picture. How do we know that she didn't tell you Taka separately?"

"Is that really it; you really don't trust me do you?"

"Well, we still don't know who the rogue ninja is" said Sakura.

"No, it's not about that is it; this is about something else, something a little deeper than that" Sasuke said arrogantly.

Shikamaru could see from Sakura's expression that she knew what he meant; him leaving the village and being an enemy rogue ninja. The wound was still fresh for her. Sakura looked hurt and embarrassed, it created an uncomfortable air. Shikamaru couldn't watch Sasuke play with her feelings like he did.

"Back off Sasuke this isn't personal, we're just being cautious alright"

"If that's how you want to play this. It'll just lead to more divisions. But just as a note, if I was the rogue, don't you think I would've made a move by now? Think about it..." he said walking away slickly.

Sakura and Shikamaru walked back into the quiet living room. The suspicions were an undying trend among them as everyone couldn't help but think about all the events that could indicate who the rogue could be...

Sakura looked at Neji as did Tenten and Shikamaru. He had been the only one outside before the silhouette they saw appeared. Ino stood up from the only dry area of the tatami floor, shifting her eyes towards Sasuke. He'd been the only one who'd left the room the previous day before Naruto arrived. Then her eyes shifted to Naruto along with Suigetsu's eyes and Kariin. Kariin looked at Sasuke and Jugo. Sasuke looked at Naruto and Neji, then at Ino. Everyone's eyes were darting back and forth among each other.

**6:28 am**

In the silence of the room, Ino noticed the very silent Taka guy they called Jugo always looking outside and gently approached him in order to break the ever approaching tenseness of the room. All eyes shot towards her but she brushed it off.

"Hi erm, I know we don't really know each other very well but erm I was just curious as to why you always keep looking outside?"

Fir a minute it appeared as if Jugo was going to completely ignore her but to her surprise he shifted his eyes to her, she could see a mild form of gentleness in his eyes. "The birds staying here in this winter aren't settled, something's been bothering them"

Before Ino could guess how he was able to sense the disturbances of nature... Once again the room became too quiet even for the suspect ninja...

Squeak...squeak...squeak...

"What's that noise?" asked Ino looking around at the rest of the alert ninja.

"That's the same noise I heard last night. I walked outside but couldn't find where it was coming from." said Neji.

Sakura looked at Suigetsu and Sasuke before he looked up at the ceiling for reasons unknown to her. So Neji hadn't been lying after all, he had heard the same noise as they had. They remembered hearing the noise of repetitive squeaking last night before the figure came.

"So you heard it too huh? I guess you Leaf ninja fought each other for nothing then." said Suigetsu.

Squeak, squeak, squeak...

"Hey guys, was that there before?" Jugo asked incredulously pointing towards something outside.

Everyone came to see. Sakura walked to the window slowly passing Jugo and looked outside. She looks outside the window at the decreasing snowfall. Then she noticed something in the distance. The source of the squeaking that she, Sasuke, Suigetsu and Neji had heard the previous night...

A swing.

A pink swing blowing in the calming frozen wind, its worn out rusted old chains squeaking in friction as it slid back and forth against the metal framing. It definitely hadn't been there before.

Sakura breathed a failing sigh. The swing was so familiar; she knew that she'd seen it before, when she'd touched the book entitled 'Hide and Seek'. She didn't let a moment pass. She had to find out about it now that another clue from a book was discovered with the help of Shikamaru. She wanted to get closer. Much closer.

She ran past everyone staring at the swing and bolted out the door before the crowd of protest could stop her-

"-Hey wait Sakura, it could be a trap! -"came Ino.

But she was already gone; she pushed open the door as the stingy yet calming wind pinched at her skin. The rest of the other ninja had no choice but to follow behind her. All of them ran behind her, forgetting their rule of not going outside. She jumped down the patio and ran behind the house towards the swing... to unknown territory...

But alas redundant déjà vu struck again...

Nothing in the world could express the frustration she felt when the swing disappeared the closer she got. Once again, it was gone...just like the figure, the night before.

"Crap it's gone again! When will the torment end!" she breathed.

"Sakura, you don't have to run away like that, it could've been a trap to lure us outside" said Shikamaru as the others caught up to her.

"But I've seen this swing before. When I touched one of the books on the shelf and a picture flashed in my head and it was of that swing we just saw."

Sakura kicked the snow in frustration as everyone took in her words. Everytime she came closer to a bit more clarity and understanding; something would disappear. She walked in front of the group, marching back to the house as the rest of the group followed.

Tenten, walking a short distance behind Neji, shared Sakura's frustrations.

"What's the point of all this, seeing these signs without any explanation?"

-Crack-

Tenten stopped immediately at the sudden noise. Her senses were on high alert as she looked around. It sounded like something solid breaking. She turned around to examine the trees behind them; staring intently at the branches. But no tree was moving.

"Did you guys just hear that?" she whispered.

"Hear _what_? What was it _this time_?" asked Suigetsu annoyed at the hang up.

They all stopped to look at her.

The wretched black birds began to crow ominously and fluttered away as she made eye contact with Neji and his emotionally supressed eyes and buried her own emotions.

"Neji, would you mind using your byakugan to search the trees?" she whispered.

"Why? What is it?"

She didn't respond but turned her head back towards the trees so that he could understand. Everyone turned towards the trees and the bone chilling birds exclaiming a disturbance. Tenten didn't know whether to trust him yet but it was worth a shot.

Neji got to it and focused his byakugan eyes. Everyone waited in anticipation as to what he might see.

"Nothing sorry" said Neji. "It's difficult to tell if a branch was moving on its own because of the wind."

Tenten shook her head; she could've sworn that she'd heard something, but didn't understand why she was the only one who heard something.

"C'mon everyone let's move. We don't want to be left out in the open like this" said Kariin feeling anxious.

They were about to walk away when Neji gasped loudly.

Everyone turned around to look at him when...the mind-numbing escalation occurred...

His gasp turned into a tormented hyperventilation.

"What the, oh my, what's going on? -"

-"What is it Neji?" asked Shikamaru alarmed.

"It's horrible!...I can see...people hanging from the trees...rope around their necks and stabbed in the stomach by their own hands!" he screamed while pointing madly. They all looked up and saw nothing.

"Seppuku" whispered Sakura thinking of the way in which the rogue ended his victims.

He saw with horror, describing what he saw. Unknown lifeless people with limp bodies hanging from trees; their broken necks squeezed the life out of them by the thick taut rope tied in a noose. Their hands firmly clutching the daggers that pierced and had slashed their blood soaked bellies.

Neji's stomach felt like it was turned inside out...he was about to be sick.

One of the dead only his eyes could see...Hizashi Hyuuga...

Neji Hyuuga let out a terrified scream, a scream never heard by the stoic ninja; it was the kind of scream that allowed someone who took himself too seriously to break any self-imposed hardness and allowed such tightly controlled vulnerability to slip through.

His bloodcurdling scream pained Tenten standing near him...his bloodcurdling scream riled up the rest of the Leaf ninja who rushed towards him.

-It's, its…Noooo! Make it stop! Please make IT STOP!" he screamed as the group came towards him in a panic. Neji fell to the soft snow floor onto his knees.

"... my, _my father, my father..." _he half choked.

Sasuke turned on his sharingan to get a better view but nothing came up. He could at least see that it was the type of jutsu that manipulated people's minds.

"Break it; it's a genjutsu!" came Sasuke.

Neji smacked his hands together with a loud clap and built up his chakra to try and break the jutsu. "Release!" he yelled...everyone waited with baited breath to see if he was successful. He tried the release again which finally set his mind free, but he was so overwhelmed that his hands fell to the floor and his byakugan, off. He was shaking.

Sakura looked at him; there was no way it could be Neji. He would never do that to himself, especially if it concerned his father.

"Neji are you okay?" cried Tenten.

"I couldn't break the genjutsu quick enough for some reason" he breathed.

"Everyone we need to go back inside before something else happens." yelled Shikamaru.

"Here let me help you up" Sakura said softly burying her pride.

"It's okay, don't worry about me, I'm fine" he said standing up shakily; from what she could see he wasn't in the right frame of mind. She'd heard him mention his father.

As they all tracked back towards the house, a loud cracking noise broke the silence of the eerie woods.

CRACK.

This time everyone heard it.

"What was that?" cried Kariin feeling frightened.

Everyone froze and looked around wildly as to where the noise could've come from. The flock of black birds flew over their heads out of the trees that added an eerie ambience.

"Don't panic, he's just trying to confuse us. He could be controlling chakra as one of us without us seeing anything." came Sasuke.

Shikamaru looked around at the group of ninja; from what he could see nobody had their hands in any kind of formation or hand signs, but Naruto...had his hands behind his back...

Tenten looked down at the snow covering her feet. For some reason the snow felt less dense and less heavy than before. She decided to take another step.

The solid snowed ground broke and crumbled underneath her feet; suddenly Tenten plunged down into frozen icy water. The below zero water came piercing her body mercilessly, like a thousand needles, stinging and numbing her body.

"Tenten!"

Every Leaf ninja exclaimed her name and flew to her.

She swam up to the surface and took a breath then tried to pull herself up out the water but the thin ice broke under her weight and she fell in again.

Neji was the first one there, he'd barely recovered from his ordeal but his byakugan was back on. He tried to rescue her and realised when he saw through the snow.

"Nobody move. IT'S A FROZEN RIVER! You'll fall in and drown if you run here" he said throwing his hands into the numbing water to help Tenten out.

Shock. It came from nowhere again. It appeared that the rogue was in an unforgiving mood.

"Suigetsu pull her out" ordered Sasuke and a reluctant Suigetsu jumped into the water after her.

"What does this mean? We can't walk on the surface of the water?" asked Sakura.

"We're not taking any chances. Get onto your stomachs, less weight on the ice." yelled Shikamaru to the rest of the ninja.

They all got onto their stomachs and crawl towards Tenten and Suigetsu trying to pull her out. Tenten could feel her nearly paralysed body giving up...any minute now she would drown if the Taka guy didn't pull her out...

Drown...just like the rogue would've wanted...even if it wasn't by her doing...

All the focus on Tenten was momentarily stolen...

As Naruto Uzumaki...made a run for it into the forested trees...

**6:55 am**

Sakura watched her beloved and trusted teammate and brother figure speed away in an unbelieving shock. Everything was happening too quickly once again...There was no time for the Leaf-Taka group to acknowledge what it meant...

"He's getting away!" shouted Shikamaru...

Fear and confusion propelled Sakura up off the ice as she gave chase and flew after Naruto.

Shikamaru came running...

Sasuke came running...

Everyone else stayed behind with Tenten, or were too slow to react to give chase...

Sakura's mind went blank; Naruto...Naruto.

It was him...it was him...

She could see him speeding up ahead as Shikamaru caught up with her...

Naruto was unnaturally fast and quiet as he bulleted through the forest. He sped in a flash of a sprint before his chasers could even catch up- except Sasuke.

Sasuke Uchiha teleported right next to the runaway Naruto and grabbed the sleeve of his jacket to slow him down but Naruto, with his free hand shot an arsenal of shuriken at him and the trees above his head. Sasuke was forced to let go of Naruto and flee as his sharingan saw the tree behind him about to tip over and crush him before it happened.

Before long, Naruto was out of sight of Sasuke, and especially Sakura and Shikamaru far behind him...he laughed a shrilly laugh of victory and thrill before disappearing...into complete blackness...

x

_The yellowy orange light beamed across the dark watery hallway as Naruto looked up at the tall unbreakable gates jailing the colossal beast inside him. It felt like he had been locked inside his own head forever. Strangely enough though, the water surrounding his feet was stirring. He looked up at the seal entrapping the ninetails. The ninetails was extremely agitated..._

"_What is it...what is that chakra...why can't I expel it!..." growled the ninetails._

"_What are you talking about?" asked Naruto. _

"_How can I reject that chakra if I can't find it...?" _

_Naruto frowned at the beast sharing his body as the splashing of running feet echoed through the hallway. Naruto stopped and gasped in shock. It sounded like footsteps...he wondered if something was there with him and the ninetails...Another chakra?_

_Sasuke? He wondered as he'd once used his sharingan to see inside of him. _

_Then something ran past him as the ninetails emitted its fierce roar and Naruto jumped backwards as a swoosh passed him at lightning speed then he screamed as he blanked out... _

_x_

Sakura and Shikamaru continued to run into the trees as they looked for Naruto and Sasuke was already long gone due to his fast speed.

"Dammit! We lost him! He's too fast!" exclaimed Shikamaru, perplexed as he and Sakura stopped. Sakura thought of the speed in which Ino employed to attack her and hurl shuriken at her; it wasn't surprising to her...

They were both interrupted by that scream. The well-known shrilly high-pitched piercing scream that stabbed their ears. They covered their ears for the duration of the scream; it felt worse because it felt so near to them.

"It came from this way, C'mon" yelled Shikamaru pointing to his left as he and Sakura ran deeper into the woods...

…Back outside the house where Suigetsu and Neji pulled Tenten out, Kariin felt a pang inside her body and exclaimed out loud.

"Ah! There it is! The other chakra, I sense it coming from the woods heading further... Wait, it just disappeared again." she yelled shaking her head towards the ninja outside...

…In the forest again...Sakura and Shikamaru ran relentlessly as they spotted someone waking up woozily and adjusting their eyes, lying down at the base of a tree wearing the black and orange jacket.

"There he is!" shouted Shikamaru and they went after him.

Naruto Uzumaki lifted his heavy head and finally woke up. He out of focus eyes tried to make sense of his surroundings. He was sitting at the base of a tree in the snow working to find any memories of what had happened to him until his eyes saw a ninja with pink hair rushing up to him...

"Sakura. Is that you? What happened? Finally I found you-

Sakura wasted no time; she tackled him with full force while pulled out her long wire string and bound his feet and hands.

"Quickly Shikamaru! Now so he can't move!" she yelled. Shikamaru did his shadow possession jutsu as lax as it was stemming from the weak sunlight through the snowed in clouds.

Naruto tried to look up at the both of them as Sakura tied him up. His head was spinning at the sudden commotion. "What, Shikamaru, Sakura? What are you guys doing, let me go" whispered Naruto.

"We did it. Finally caught him." said Shikamaru relieved. But Sakura was still unsatisfied; she took 'Naruto by the neck tightly.

"You, you monster, where is the real Naruto? Transform back into yourself!" she spat.

"What are you talking about, what real Naruto?" he asked trying to make sense of his surroundings.

"Liar! We saw you running into this forest, trying to escape when Tenten was drowning." she roared holding his neck tighter.

"Tenten was what?...Sakura...I don't know what you're talking about; weren't you guys looking for me? I was knocked out after that blast a few minutes ago".

Sakura punched his side as he tried to recoil in pain but was paralysed by shadow possession. "You know very well that the blast that separated us was yesterday afternoon already. We found everyone and you lastly after three hours. You were with us the whole time."

Naruto looked at them stupefied. "Three hours? What are you talking about, I haven't been with anybody. I've been knocked out since the blast. But you're saying that I've been knocked out for a whole day? It's been a whole day already?"

Sakura stopped to look into his shiny confused worried blue eyes. She felt herself being sucked into his act...

"Ignore him. He is just trying to confuse us. He's somehow able to read us and he knows that you would fall for his innocent act because you're partners and friends with Naruto." said Shikamaru.

"I want to take him back to the house. So we can all deal with this mess." she said as she got up and pulled a complaining Naruto along with her by the wire bounding him. Shikamaru walked carefully behind her as he moved with the shadow possession hoping in his heart that they wouldn't later regret postponing his killing at that moment.

While they dragged him along the forest, Sasuke who was breathing heavily found them pulling Naruto along.

"What are you guys doing? We need to kill that bastard now!" yelled Sasuke.

Sakura held onto him tighter protecting her catch. A wired and bound Naruto looked up at Sasuke with slanted eyes like he was seeing an angel; seeing Sakura and Shikamaru talking mutually with Sasuke and not fighting, was everything to him...

"Sakura, I agree with Sasuke, we have to kill this rogue ninja right now before he finds any opportunity to try anything." said Shikamaru stopping.

"And what am I supposed to tell Kakashi sensei when we get back to the village? That we killed the enemy but I failed to bring Naruto back? This rogue is the only person who knows where the real Naruto is" she cried.

That seemed to appease Sasuke. For him, finding out where the real Naruto was so that he didn't land up in the 'wrong hands' from his perspective was crucial...

"If we're bringing him with us, we have to do it and fast..." said Sasuke helping Sakura heave the dizzy Naruto back out of the forest. They carried on walking through the forest and out towards the other group of ninja.

While there, Suigetsu moulded himself back from being a formless liquid state back into a solid human being with Tenten coughing and splatting in the cold.

"Guys, we got him!" said Shikamaru triumphantly as he Sakura and Sasuke emerged out of the forest pulling Naruto along.

"Fantastic! And we got Tenten" said Ino after Suigetsu placed her onto the snowed and finally solid ground.

"Tenten, are you okay?" said Neji as he held onto her. She didn't respond but lay on the snowed ground. He could see that her body was going into shock so he picked her up into his arms and carried her into the house.

"And what do we make of this?" asked Kariin with a disgusted look on her face as she walked with Sakura and Sasuke pulling Naruto.

"I want him to talk before we get rid of him, he knows where the real Naruto is. He doesn't die before I find out!" Sakura said daring anyone to oppose her.

Kariin shrugged at her as the rest of the ninja team walked back into the house.

**7:24 am**

Neji grabbed a few blankets from the sleeping bags and the quilt blanket on the armrest of the couch to throw over his teammate. Tenten clutched the blanket as if onto life itself and shivered uncontrollably with her teeth clattering loudly. Watching her in a tortured state made Neji feel helpless; he was dying for answers. How had a frozen lake appeared where solid ground had stood?

Sasuke and Sakura dragged Naruto onto the wet tatami floor as Shikamaru broke his shadow possession jutsu.

Seeing everyone in an unidentified house he'd never seen filled Naruto with more confusion. Neji, Tenten appearing to be near death and was that...the Taka!

"Huh? It's the Taka; please tell me what's going on here? What are you looking at me like that for? Why are you guys binding me? What is this place? What are the Taka doing here?" yelled Naruto. Nobody listened to him.

"Shut up and break whatever transformation or body doubling jutsu you're using now." said Sakura hovering her fist above Naruto's head.

"Wait, Sakura, what are you doing?" he asked staring up at her and breathing quickly. His mind couldn't keep up. She couldn't kill him; she couldn't kill the rogue while he still looked like Naruto.

"It's me...It's me Naruto. What's gotten into you guys?" he asked innocently; he knew that his Leaf comrades could never hurt him...ever...

"Wait! Said Kariin. "Somehow, I think he could be telling the truth. I sensed the strong chakra that we assumed belongs to the rogue ninja deep in the forest when this Leaf Village girl was drowning. Then it disappeared again and all I can say is that it's different from this one." said Kariin.

"How do you mean different?" demanded Sasuke.

"This has to be the ninetails boy for sure. I sensed his chakra separately from the other evil feeling chakra right beside it before it disappeared again. It happened the same way that it had when this ninetails boy first arrived here yesterday."

The group of ninja tried to gather their thoughts. The changes were too quick to comprehend.

"Now that I think about it, it makes sense. We lost the rogue running away as Naruto for a while in the forest when he ran ahead of us in an unbelievable speed. All that time could've given him a chance to swop himself as the fake Naruto with the real Naruto who was unconscious, and place him by that tree before running away again" said Shikamaru.

"Which means that the rogue was pretending to be Naruto all along. This is apparently is the real Naruto" said Ino.

Sakura relaxed her hard stance. It was the real Naruto. They had the real Naruto...she turned towards him and gave him a relieved hug.

"Would somebody mind telling me what's going on?" came Naruto still blank.

"You, You're such a knucklehead Naruto" she smiled at him. "Do you remember the rogue ninja we were sent here to assassinate? Well he's been impersonating you since we found him or 'you'...that's why we captured you" she said out of breath.

Naruto looked at the wet floor in an attempt to understand and calm his overworked head.

"Wait, but Sasuke...since you here with us, wherever this place is, and we're not fighting... does this mean you're coming back and joining team Kakashi..." he asked treading softly and careful not to get his hopes up.

Sasuke's bored face looked up at the incessant Naruto. It was the curse...he wondered if they could return the preferred fake Naruto back just so that he wouldn't have to deal with the nagging real one... "Team Kakashi? What's that?"

Meanwhile Sakura's relief was short-lived as guilt washed over her looking at Neji trying his absolute best at comforting Tenten which he wasn't used to. Their eyes met. Sakura looked away in shame. Neji shook it off...

"It still doesn't make sense though. How was he able to go undetected by this Kariin girl for so long until he had to swop the bodies by some tree? And if he was the fake, how did he know personal information about me?" asked Neji.

They all shook their heads confused. Nobody had an answer.

"That's just the thing..._how_. _How_ did he do it? He was so perfect. He was able to get away with it for a whole day and we still haven't even seen his real face in person yet... Nothing that he did was out of the ordinary." said Shikamaru.

Sakura thought. "Wait; there was something that was strange. Naruto was able to tell me where I'd seen the Kamakura name when he hadn't been there when we first saw it."

"And Suigetsu and I noticed this fake ninetails guy, he tried using some jutsu last night but for some reason he just fell to the floor and screamed as if he was in pain. None of you probably noticed because you Leaf ninja were too busy fighting each other and Sasuke." said Jugo.

"So what does that mean? Maybe he can't perform any jutsu of the person he impersonates but he can...I don't know, read minds?" said Ino thinking about the telepathic jutsu that her Yamanaka clan had.

"No he can't read minds but it's pretty close to it. Now that I think about it, the frozen river coming out of nowhere. The strange apparition like person holding a lantern last night which disappeared. The swing appearing and vanishing. Sakura seeing the swing in her head when she apparently touched some book. The convenience of the candles and matches appearing. Shikamaru being stabbed by a shuriken even though as he wasn't found yet, he was probably close by...they were all mind games." said Sasuke.

"Genjutsu." said Shikamaru nodding his head in agreement. "Sakura and I found eleven sets of cups, plates and spoons in the previously empty kitchen before we found the rogue. We think he placed those dishes there using genjutsu to send us some kind of message"

They all soaked it in.

"I also found out that the rogue's a pretty good genjutsu type shinobi" said Ino feeling quite timid.

"How would you know this?" asked Shikamaru.

"Because last night, I had a dream or a memory, I don't know…a nightmare where I think he placed a genjutsu on me that showed"-she hesitated for a while-"that showed Sasuke drowning me in a pool of water in the bathroom basin. There was blood on my hands. I think I was the one who stabbed Neji but I don't remember." she said quietly.

Neji shook his head at her slowly...Sakura thought about it...it couldn't be as simple as they thought.

"Then why was Neji the only one who saw dead people hanging from trees? Sasuke, I thought your sharingan was able to see through genjutsu?"

"It is. But this time the rogue pretending to be Naruto made the genjutsu specifically for Neji and only for him to see. It could've been payback for what you did to him, stabbing his arm and stomach so he showed you what he does best; drowning and suicide by disembowelment." said Sasuke to Neji.

Sakura hoped that it was safe to assume that the rogue was no longer pretending to be one of them, knowing that it was never safe to assume anything in the ninja world but she took the chance.

"I think Sasuke is right. I'm not entirely sure about the genjutsu part but I do know that the rogue is big on...revenge" she said trying not to look at Sasuke. "I read a poem in one of the books on the bookshelf but I was too afraid to speak out because of the rogue being amongst us. It read that someone was seeking revenge on those who had betrayed him. It went on to say, 'you do seppuku' as if he was ordering someone to do it to themselves."

"You think it's about the rogue ninja?" asked Sasuke.

"I think the books on this shelf are about him or were written by him. There are so many references to him. He could be a Kamakura living here. See I found out from another book that the Kamakura family, which is the name of the family who lived or live here, ran a family owned funeral business." said Sakura.

"What do you mean by that? Were they undertakers?" asked Neji.

"I don't know. But one person, who lived here, one Namiko Kamakura, read self-written poetry at funerals. That's why there are so many books here"

"Well let's find out the real truth about this house." said Sasuke. "Naruto, you have the most chakra and it seems okay to do it now. Break the genjutsu" instructed Sasuke.

They all looked at him as if he was still the suspected rogue ninja...

"What are you talking about?" asked Naruto.

"Just do it. There is a genjutsu seal hanging above us on the ceiling and there's one in the kitchen I only saw it with my sharingan."

The entire group was left reeling at the information he'd kept from them.

"Why didn't you say anything?" demanded Sakura.

"What and alert the rogue ninja that I was onto him? Let's see what's really going on here."

Sasuke jumped towards the roof while Naruto just went along with what Sasuke said and smacked his fists and he ripped off the seal. Everyone waited with bated breath for any repercussions. None came.

The room swirled and swam in front of the all before it completely changed...All of their mouths dropped when they saw what the house really looked like.

**8:07 am**

Black and ashen. Soot smeared. Coal painted.

The house was beyond charred.

Black. Burned. Desolate.

The once beautiful house with the homely tatami flooring, wooden walls, and white translucent fusuma panel sliding doors were all gone. Now it was replaced by black walls, collapsing beams and columns of the house with the almost non existing soot layered couch that Shikamaru had laid on. The only thing that remained constant was the water leaking from the bathroom beginning to make a small flood in the burned living room.

The entire group of ninja gasped at the surprise.

"It's all burned. I wonder what happened here?" whispered Kariin as her face fell in dismay.

Naruto and Sakura jumped up from sitting below the fireplace to avoid blackening their clothing. Tenten threw the scorched quit blanket off of her body when she saw it transformed back into its real state. Sasuke ran his hands over the soot on the dry area of the floor. It felt hardened against the floor, which meant that if the house had been burned, it had happened quite a long time ago…

They all walked around examining the place. Shikamaru saw another door had appeared by the living room. A new door...he opened it...

There were seven other doors leading to other unknown rooms that had been sealed out of sight by the genjutsu. The entire area was also burned but somehow; there were signs of recovery; someone had swept the soot caused by a fire and some of the wood had been replaced and boarded up.

"Hey guys, there are more rooms this way but they look slightly repaired." he told the other ninja.

Everyone except Tenten walked down the new hallway and slid open the doors one by one. The six of them were empty spare rooms but one was sealed shut completely.

Shikamaru noticed that there were trapdoors and secret doors, hidden passageways leading to other rooms and the backdoor lying scattered all around the new parts of the house. It appeared that every nook and cranny was some kind of place of concealment. They all searched through everything; looking for anything else that could be hiding.

Neji's byakugan eyes found the hidden secret waiting to be discovered lying stashed inside the unlit fireplace.

"Hey guys look here. There are paper bombs stuffed inside here. Why would the Kamakura's need that in the house? Or maybe they torched the house themselves before leaving permanently?" asked Neji.

"At this point, nothing about this house could surprise me any more than it has" said Suigetsu. Sasuke looked quite pleased at the discovery. He walked over to the fireplace and pulled out as many as there were and piled them on the floor.

"We should all be thankful that Sakura told Suigetsu to leave the firewood behind in the forest last night, or we would've lit this fireplace and blown ourselves away" he said eyeing Sakura and Suigetsu who felt just as lucky…

Sakura needed clarity from the supposedly real Naruto. "Naruto tell us about what you remember during the time of the blast" said Sakura approaching him and choosing to stand instead of sit on any burned or wet area.

"Well after the blast all I remember was feeling dizzy and then I saw the little girl then I blacked out and woke up now in the forest-"

"-Wait, what little girl?" asked Sakura. She knew to take him seriously when he said he saw some unknown child because of a similar incident once.

"I don't know, she said that she wanted to play a game with me. But after telling her that I couldn't play she got upset and I blacked out"

Neji was shocked as he remembered something in the forest. "Did you say a game?"

"Yes why?"

"That's what Sakura said to me when I found her in the forest. She said that she wanted to play and after I rejected her childish ways, she was also upset and left me."

"I never did that Neji, like I said before." said Sakura.

"Then it must've been the rogue who transformed himself as a Sakura look-alike and pretended to be you when you were knocked out. That could explain why Sakura was acting like a little girl. What game did she say she wanted to play?"

"Hide and seek" said Naruto casually.

Both Neji and Sakura gasped as everyone looked at them. Neji remembered what Sakura had said to him and Sakura remembered the poem.

"The poem. I read a poem about hide and seek in one of the books on the shelf. That's the book I touched and the image of the pink swing flashed in my head..."

"And I never saw a little girl but Sakura asked me to play hide and seek."

"Sakura, you mentioned a poem? What did the poem mean?" asked Shikamaru.

"The book is called hide and seek and it had the same poem on it on every page. It was very vague." she said walking over to the bookcase and not even attempting to open it seeing as the cover was burned so most likely the pages were like ash now.

"So what about the little girl business?" asked Jugo. Do you think he could also be using a little girl?"

"We can't be sure yet but at least we know that we're dealing with a genjutsu type shinobi who could be a Kamakura who lived in this house and can transform or double himself to look like another person. He has incredible speed and he may be out for revenge. That's what we have so far." said Shikamaru.

After they'd all finished discussing Neji went back to Tenten. She was still shivering and her teeth clattering. She'd tried listening to what everyone was saying but she was still frozen and numb. Neji came and sat next to her.

"Tenten, how are you feeling now?" he said.

"Pain in my legs. Freezing. I'm exhausted" was all she could muster. Neji figured that she was still in a state of shock. He took her shoulder.

"Neji, can you do me a favour?" she asked quietly.

"Sure what do you need?"

"Will you smile for me?"

He was so taken aback at her unusual request. "Why?" he asked; it was one of Tenten's quirks to be silly…in his opinion.

"Because you hardly ever smile so when you do, it makes everything special." she knew that she was being silly but she wanted to loosen him up.

"So you think it was me at one time the rogue as Neji?"

"I can only tell by how you smile. The real Neji would want me to be one hundred percent sure"

Neji tried his best attempt at a genuine smile but it came out awkward and crooked, making Tenten laugh. The luxury of his smile, it was a rarity, She thought about it in her head, it was awkward, embarrassed and preeny as if he was too good or above such 'nonsense.'

"You really thought it was me didn't you?" he asked internally delighted that he'd made her laugh.

"I couldn't be sure. You were acting strangely. The real Neji would've never hurt Naruto the way you did when interrogating him…or me"

Neji looked away from her as his soul was awash with guilt mixed with regret and self-hatred.

"I'm sorry…I don't even know what to say because there isn't any excuse for my barbaric behaviour. But I was afraid and I snapped. I just wanted to protect you especially since we found out that the hidden rogue killed people through suicide... I knew that we couldn't afford to be soft so I panicked, for you. But I wish it was me. I wish I had been the rogue when I hit you, so you wouldn't think that the real me is a monster."

Tenten gave him a long hard look as he couldn't look back at her…haunted by his actions… then she leaned her head on his shoulder

**8:26 am**

Kariin felt a tiny prickling inside her body coming from one of the rooms that had previously been hidden from them by the genjutsu seal on the ceiling. It wasn't strong enough for her to raise an alarm, although it did spark some curiosity in her.

She shifted her eyes to sweep across the room of ninja who were preoccupied with the paper bombs and discussing. She managed to slip away unnoticed and walked down the new hall, following the flickering inside of her, walking past six rooms and stopping at the seventh one which appeared to be the biggest room. She slid open the fusuma panel door.

Her eyes lit up slightly as she took in the unique sight of a somewhat plainly coloured yet cluttered bedroom with an abundance of candles, dried out flowers, calendars and pictures strewn about the room, long forgotten in the isolated house.

She stepped inside and felt a single trail of liquid slide down her face...Kariin brushed off the nosebleed and continued inside the room without a moment's hesitation...

She walked over to the side table nearest to her; there was a huge pile of letters, photographs, notes, envelopes, poetry books and religious texts stacked on top of each other, all collecting dust...Kariin decided to pick up one of the old photo's:

It showed a group of fourteen people lined up for the photo with the words 'Kamakura Funeral Services' written on the building they were standing in front of. It looked like it could be in downtown Grass Village. The people in the photo were all standing stoically and weren't smiling, except for a young looking woman warmly cradling a toddler girl who already had a waterfall of black hair.

Kariin couldn't help but smile as she examined the photo of the long mysterious Kamakura family and their family run funeral services as the Sakura girl of the Leaf had told them. She figured that the chakra she'd felt must've come from that bedroom flickering with forgotten chakra.

She looked at more photos, of the Kamakura's attending funerals, the women in the picture reading from a poetry book in front of mourners...then there was the picture of the toddler girl she'd seen in the picture of the Kamakura family as a whole...she was more grown than before but...the look in her face, one that no innocent girl should have. A mean snarl tarnished her distraught looking face...

Kariin placed the pictures back and looked up to stare at the many drawings lining the entire perimeter of the bedroom wall. It appeared to be a child who'd drawn the pictures. She noticed that they appeared to be in a sequence, like some kind of picture story.

The pictures began with a happy family of a mother, and a young girl surrounded by a meadow of tall grass.

Next picture: a deformed looking monster arrived and destroyed their home...

Next picture: the young girl who had blue tears drawn on her face was being yelled at by many random people...

Next picture, the mother and daughter were standing in a different grassy plain...but Kariin straightened her glasses as she looked closer and closer... at the picture...

Next Picture: The many people had their faces crossed out by a black ink and their bodies were covered in red blotches...

Kariin was so captivated, so caught off guard by the disturbing picture...

She didn't notice the fusuma door sliding closed by itself until...

An overwhelmingly consuming sharp pang filled her body and made her stiff.

Behind her.

She realised what was happening but she'd detected it too late. She took out a kunai knife...

Too late.

Someone grabbed her abdomen from behind and took her arm holding the kunai and shoved it in her mouth as Kariin tried to scream with eyes wide in horror.

"_Didn't I make it clear to all of you that no knives were allowed? Somebody's gonna get hurt. Someone's gonna wanna stab themselves..."_ came the low demonic drawl of the man standing behind her.

Kariin was completely anchored on the ground as her body refused to move except for the hair on her body that stiffened. She tried in a deep state of panic to reach for the closed-door and kick it to get attention...so close...Sasuke and the others were just in the next few rooms in the living room yet she couldn't reach them...so close...she tried yelling.

"_Sssh, now now. If you even make a sound, every bastard that living room who so much as moves will set off all those paper bombs and blow your bits into the sky..."_ he chuckled sadistically as he shoved the sharp kunai further into her mouth to muzzle her. Kariin could feel the corners of her mouth tearing as the kunai struggled to fit inside her mouth...

A tear trickled down her face as she stood helplessly in the hands of an evil murderer...He pressed his blue chapped lips against her ear sending an electrifying stiffness through her body. His scent was pretty strong. Like blood and sweat...

"_You sure got yourself a pretty spankin' little body don't cha? I would sure love to get inside you...get inside your head. Trust me; when I get inside your head, I will drive you crazy, so crazy 'till you beg me to kill yourself. Oh yeahhhh..."_ he laughed and breathed mouth-watering in her ear.

He slowly slid the kunai out of her mouth, cutting the corners of her lips as she exclaimed softly in agony…

…Back in the living room Suigetsu noticed something forming on Sasuke's shoulder.

"Sasuke, your neck, it has the curse mark is back." yelled Suigetsu wide-eyed. Everyone looked at him alarmed.

"Oh no Sasuke look at my shoulder!" panicked Jugo. Both their necks now had curse marks with the most sickening self-mutilated looking scratches around their curse marks...

"You don't think-

"No. He's not back alive, I would've felt it. Relax it's just a genjutsu...wait a second…" Sasuke said jumping up. He realised what it meant. The rogue ninja had to be nearby. He scanned the room.

"Kariin? KARIIN where are you?" he yelled out. "Quickly, search for her now!"

The entire group of ninja frantically searched around for her. They ran as fast as they could prying open all the panel doors, trapdoors and hidden compartments.

…Back in the seventh bedroom…Kariin could hear Sasuke calling out to her hoping that they would find her soon...

"_C'mon open the right door...Sasuke please!_" she sobbed in her head.

He smirked. "_Looks like they've caught on...but I haven't decided whether I'm going to let you die yet...See there's this game that I like to play but I'm having me some difficulty... if you could just help me...give me a word that rhymes with…_

_Hyuuga..._

"_Sasuke, Sasuke, Sasuke..." _Was all she could think. She could hear them coming closer and closer...but she had to stall him for now before he decided to do something drastic...

"I c, c, c, c...can't" she cried unable to speak through the extreme pain of her bleeding mouth as she shook the tears off her face. Desperation clouded her mind and she went blank. There was no chance that she could think of a rhyming word...

"_Too bad...Unfortunately that's not the answer I was looking for..._" he said stiffly in her ear as he yanked and grabbed a fistful of her cherry red hair.

"_Two doors away...two more doors..." _she could hear them furiously sliding and slamming all six doors to find her.

The rogue ninja slammed her against the wall and vanished as she screamed and Sasuke Uchiha along with Jugo right behind him, burst open the door to find Karin crumbled on the floor, the bottom jaw of her face swimming in blood...

**A/N: Of course it was Naaaaarutooo! But wow, I can't believe that it's nearly the end, two max. three more chapters to go...But I wonder if anyone's caught on with the significance of the chapter headings yet...**


	5. Chapter 5:Hide and Seek

**Chapter 5: Hide and Seek**

**A/N: ****T****here is mo****re dialogue in this chapter as the investigation reaches a climax...**

**8:41am**

Kariin pressed her hands ever so slightly over the blood seeping out of the sliced corners of her mouth to contain the bleeding as she gazed up despondently at Jugo's warm concerned eyes. He took in her torture while he carried her in his big arms back to the blackened living room.

Sasuke walked down the new hallway behind Jugo carrying the injured Kariin with Sakura and Ino walking next to him; they were carrying the pile of photos taken from the seventh room along with the five disturbing crayon and ink drawings, in order, pasted on the walls by a child. They had all recoiled at the unnerving drawings.

Sasuke shook his head incredibly pissed; pissed at himself that he hadn't seen the incident coming and pissed that Kariin had almost gotten herself killed so foolishly. Her death would've greatly affected their team Taka dynamics...Sakura watched Sasuke's scowl wishing she knew what was going on in his head; she tried to eject any jealousy of his worry and panic of the Taka girl Kariin's injuries.

"Is she okay?" asked Naruto as they arrived back in the living room. The cold and blank stares from the ninja arriving into the living room answered his question.

Kariin watched the Leaf ninja girl who had fallen into the genjutsu frozen lake shiver against the mostly scorched blankets she was clutching as Jugo placed her next to Tenten on the nearly non-existent burned couch. Then her eyes shifted to the other Leaf ninja girls who took out a medical kit and began wiping the blood off her jaw and chin with a damp cloth.

Sakura and Ino concentrated their teal coloured chakra around a fussy Kariin's mouth to heal the two and a half centimetre cut extending out from the corners of her mouth into her cheeks.

Kariin wanted to bury her head in shame but there was too much blood on her face to move her head. She was fuming with anger at the condescending treatment by the Leaf. After she had behaved like a child, now she was being treated like one. She couldn't take it and needed an outlet to express her embarrassment and short temper.

"Gimme that, I can do it myself!" she snapped at the pink haired Leaf ninja, snatching the cloth from her and wiping her mouth. She regretted speaking immediately as the sting of her cut mouth throbbed excruciatingly.

"Can you heal yourself too? Ino and I shouldn't even be using Konohan medical ninjutsu taught exclusively to us _only_ for the use of the Leaf and by the Leaf to heal someone considered an enemy." Sakura shot back. Kariin bit back a retort. She was overwhelmed with maddening fear and guilt. The minute her mouth was healed she jumped into explanations and excuses.

"Sasuke, forgive me please! It's all my fault, I'm so sorry Sasuke", she whined dramatically, "I wondered off like a naïve little genin. I didn't realise that the seventh room had previously been sealed shut. It was so reckless of me." She cried over-apologetically hoping that Sasuke wouldn't express his annoyance at her ridiculous behaviour.

"What were you thinking leaving without notifying anyone? We had a deal not to allow anyone to leave in single digits. It's so unlike you to fall for such a trap Kariin" he lambasted at her crossing his arms.

She was finally able to look down and hide her face. "Exactly; you know that I would never have wondered off like I did, which means whatever tricks he's using, he's brilliant at it. Brilliant enough that I fell for his bait, playing around with chakra like it was a toy."

"So then what did he do to your mouth?" asked Suigetsu soaking in the comfortable watery environment.

She shook her head. "He shoved a kunai in my mouth to gag me; I couldn't even see if he looked like the man in the picture because he was standing behind me; holding onto me." she said bitterly feeling violated. She couldn't take it anymore.

"Is there anything that he said to you?" asked Shikamaru hoping that the rogue would unknowingly have given her some kind of clue to his location.

As reluctant as she was to think back to the terrifying incident, Kariin only remembered one thing in particular that had caught her unawares.

"Which one of you here, presumably from the Leaf, responds to the word Hyuuga?" she asked slowly lifting her head up and scanning the group. All the Leaf ninja's eyes including former Leaf shinobi Sasuke shot straight to Neji.

"Me. That's my surname. Why?" said Neji cautiously; he had no idea how the Taka girl knew his last name. Kariin observed him sitting close to the Leaf ninja who'd almost drowned.

"You better start counting your final hours," she whispered looking him straight in his eyes as his and Tenten's next to him widened in shock, "You're a dead man-

-Now who the hell do you think you are saying things like that-

-The rogue ninja called your boyfriend out by name. He asked me to help him think of a word that rhymes with 'Hyuuga'." she said to Tenten after Tenten's outburst.

Tenten's hands shot straight over her mouth in shock as the rest of the Leaf ninja looked at each other apprehensively. Shikamaru cursed under his breath. No shinobi feared anything more than someone on their team being singled out as a target. Naruto crunched his fists while Neji however closed his eyes and looked down; giving a small smile of confidence.

"How silly," he sighed nonchalantly, "I'm not afraid of anything. Death threats, as vague as they might be, are just part of being a shinobi. Clearly he feels threatened by me which has prompted him to try and kill me. So I guess I _must_ be doing something right..."

Tenten looked at him outraged at his lack of caution.

"But this is different. We have no idea what we're dealing with. He's targeting you now just like he did with that genjutsu!" she cried; she was far more afraid for him than he was for himself. Neji stared into her dreading eyes.

"There was one other thing he said to me which I didn't understand. He said something like 'didn't I tell you that no knives were allowed because someone's gonna get hurt or stab themselves'" said Kariin.

Sakura's eyes shot to Shikamaru. That was the one piece of evidence Sakura had been hoping for from the beginning...

"That's it! That's all we needed. Confirmation straight from the horse's mouth." said Sakura excitedly, standing up on the wet floor. "Remember what Shikamaru said about us him finding the eleven sets of spoons, plates and cups in the kitchen that had appeared under the genjutsu...we forgot to say that it was written in a poetry book entitled 'Broken Pieces of Silver' straight from this bookshelf. Which means the rogue ninja did write that poem and it means what I've wanted to find out. He _has _been using these books to communicate with us and more importantly...these books are connected to him!" she said as Shikamaru and the rest of the group except Kariin appeared to be quite satisfied at the revelation.

"You're wrong." claimed Kariin vehemently.

"What do you mean I'm wrong? What you just said, he told you that 'no knives were allowed' is written in that exact book 'Broken Pieces of Silver' in the poem about 'ereben' or eleven spoons, cups and plates'. He used the poem to tell us that he was hiding among us" said Sakura but Kariin wasn't convinced.

Kariin ran her fingers through her cherry hair in distress and looked up as Sasuke in the momentary silence. Her eyes were begging for him to hear her plea.

"Sasuke, she breathed, "We need to leave here before that psychopath comes back. The storm is calming down now and the rogue has been ousted from our two Taka-Leaf groups. We have no reason to stay here anymore. Please…this isn't our mission."

Sasuke looked at Jugo and Suigetsu; he could see the wary expressions on their faces that they felt the same way. Then he looked at the Leaf and especially at Naruto who stared back at him with a big gleam in his shiny blue eyes, just waiting..._waiting_ for any announcement that Sasuke was leaving... because he would never allow it and would gladly give chase to somehow take Sasuke back to Konoha...

...Sasuke on the other hand only then realised how badly the events would turn if something were to happen to Naruto...he would lose his leverage from a powerful someone from the Akatsuki he'd betrayed a while back.

"Sorry Kariin, but we need to see this through to the end and make sure that this rogue bastard is killed..._especially_ because Naruto had been the rogue." We need to make sure that Naruto survives." he said carefully hiding his motives.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" chimed Naruto way too hopeful and gullible thinking that his once best friend was finally starting to care about him. Sakura placed a hand on Naruto's shoulder trying to calm his relative excitement.

Kariin shook her head at the wet floor in frustration. "We have no idea what we're dealing with. This guy, he's able to mask or hide his chakra or at least manipulate it. It's like a light switch he can click on, off or even dim and flicker it to the point that I didn't even realise that it was him because I know is chakra as being suffocatingly strong. He could be standing just outside the door right now and I wouldn't know. I mean look Sasuke, your curse mark is still there with whatever sickening scratches around it. He's using genjutsu on you right this minute" she ranted desperately.

"It begs the question though, for the rogue ninja to use a genjutsu on Neji to see his father and make the curse mark appear on Sasuke's shoulder...how does he know all of this?" asked Shikamaru. Sakura's eyes shifted towards Kariin.

"That's right; Sasuke and I have never had these scratches around our curse marks before." said Jugo.

Sakura's pale green eyes began to bore fixatedly into Kariin's light eyes. She was trying to communicate something to her. To make her feel the heat of her silence...

"Kariin. You know we can't help you if you don't tell us what you know. The sooner we're done with this mission, the sooner you can leave like you want to."

"I don't know what you're talking about" snapped Kariin.

"The man in the picture. The rogue ninja. We know you recognised him. Is he a Kamakura living in this house? Does the doll in the picture belong to a girl that Naruto could've seen in the forest?" she asked with everyone staring at Kariin.

Kariin remained silent for a moment. "I don't know anything about a doll or a girl"

"You know what, forget it, you're hopeless," scolded Sakura towards Kariin completely fed up and throwing her hands in the air, "We'll just have to find out about the rogue ninja by ourselves. We have plenty of resources here linked to the rogue and clearly we're going to have to sift through all these books to find out about him"

"I think you're missing the main objective here Sakura. Our mission is to eliminate the rogue ninja, not find out about his life or what happened to the Kamakura's" said Ino.

"Ino, I think the only way to find and kill the rogue and perhaps find his weakness is to find out about him and the Kamakura's using the breadcrumbs that they left behind" she said referring to the books, pictures and drawings.

Shikamaru confirmed with a nod of his head and Sakura felt even more confident after his approval that she was doing the right thing. Neji Tenten and a reluctant Sasuke walked over to the many pictures, drawings and books to begin the search for answers.

"This is going to take forever." whined Suigetsu who more than happily sat in the pool of water flooding the floor.

**9:10 am**

Shikamaru flipped through the photographs of the Kamakura's given to him by Ino until he stopped at one picture that made him recoil. A girl who appeared to be the same girl he'd seen in the bigger Kamakura family as a whole only slightly older this time. It was her facial expression. It reminded him of when he'd seen Gaara trying to kill Rock Lee in a hospital during their Chunin exams years ago. Her facial expression had the same menacing bloodlust written all over it.

"Hey Naruto, does this by any chance look like the girl you saw in the forest?" he asked holding the picture for him and the rest of the group to see her villainous face.

"Yes! It's her," said Naruto but the closer he looked at the photo the more his shock grew, "She looks so mad...but she didn't have that _kind_ of look on her face though. She looked quite untidy and come to think of it, she had one trail of blood coming from her nose."

Sakura stopped scanning book pages and her head shot up in shock. So did Kariin and Tenten.

"Oh my goodness," whispered Sakura, "I had a trail of blood coming from my nose when I heard a strange high pitched voice coming from the forest-

-Me too but I only felt a nosebleed before I entered this house" said Tenten.

-And me...in the seventh room." whispered Kariin.

The room was completely taken aback.

"You know, come to think of it, all those screams that hurt our ears were very shrill and high pitched...the same way a little girl would scream...I can't believe it, there really _is_ a little girl in the forest. But how is it that the rogue hadn't found her or killed her?" said Tenten.

"Wait; remember there was a doll inside the rogue ninja's pocket. And all these crayon drawings. They could both be on the same team, helping each other...but let's not jump to conclusions...we should keep looking" said Sasuke.

Sakura paced around trying to think about all the information they had found out thus far. Then she walked over to the fruitful blackened bookshelf. Most of the books were damaged beyond repair which gave Sakura a thought. Now that the genjutsu had been lifted off the house, it would probably be a good idea for her to take another look at them and see what had been hidden away by the genjutsu.

"_But why would the rogue purposefully leave behind clues to his life for us to find_? _Does he _want_ us to find out?_" she said inside her head. She leaned in closer to the shelf and saw the ashen pieces of paper shoved in between the book spaces. One of them had miraculously survived the burn because it had been shoved at the back of a thick book which only had its cover and front pages burned.

It was a clipping of a newspaper article:

**The Kusa Chronicles:**

Asami Wataru

_We regret to inform the citizens of Kusagakure that Ms. Namiko Kamakura of the Kamakura Funeral Services tragically died yesterday, after drowning in Yoritomo Lake outside the Village. Unfortunately her body has yet to be discovered by local Grass Village authorities. Kamakura Funeral Services has thus now been discontinued seeing as the rest of the family had vacated to other lands since the attack on Grass Village. She is survived in Kusagakure by her only child, her daughter, who was taken in by a distant cousin after the rest of the Kamakura family refused to take her in- _

Sakura read the small snippet of the article with a sinking and sombre feeling. Alas the one person that they'd found out lived in the house they were staying in, had tragically died. The rest of the article, Sakura noticed curiously had been torn off rather than burned off like most of the other books and texts on the shelf...Clearly someone wanted to conceal the truth once again.

"Hey guys listen up," said Sakura to the rest of the group, "I just found a piece of an article here from the Grass Village newspaper, and it says that Namiko Kamakura, the person whose name is written on one of these books, died after drowning in Yoritomo lake but her body wasn't discovered. Therefore their Kamakura family business was closed because all the other Kamakura's emigrated from Kusagakure after some attack on Grass Village. Then her daughter was taken in by a distant cousin after the rest of the family refused to take her in." she said feeling sorrowful after the grim article.

A lightbulb went on in Ino's head. All the pictures and drawings they had taken from the very significant seventh bedroom had one particular picture that could reveal the answer.

"Attack? Wait a minute, one of the pictures we took off the wall had some kind of crazy looking monster painted on it; Maybe some child was trying to paint whatever the monster attacked their village...it could've been some kind of tailed beast, or...the oni that attacked us yesterday when we arrived".

"It can't be a tailed beast because there would be nothing left of the Grass Village. Although it could be the demon dog because it was a summoning and summoning's only attack when their owners tell them to. So the rogue ninja could've summoned the beast to try and destroy the village." said Sasuke.

"What it the date of that newspaper article?" asked Kariin sceptically.

"Three years ago. That's probably why we didn't hear about any attack, we were still genin" said Sakura.

"If that article is from three years ago, then it wasn't the rogue who attacked the Grass Village"

"How do you know?" asked Sasuke.

Kariin remained silent. Sakura wanted to punch her lights out in annoyance.

"So then according to the article Namiko had remained in the village while the rest of the family moved away after the attack?" asked Tenten.

"I don't think so," came Shikamaru, "If you look at these pictures in sequence like we found them, the last drawn picture shows the little girl and her mother in a location different from their first location but it's a similar grassy plain, so they could've left the Grass Village but not to other lands. They could've...moved to this house because as Naruto said, he did see a girl in the forest"

Kariin lifted the photo of the entire Kamakura family as a whole and stared at it. There was only one person holding a child. It was the smiling woman cradling the baby girl with the dark hair. It had to be her.

"This woman, she has to be Namiko Kamakura. Perhaps this little girl is the daughter who was taken in by a cousin when Namiko died." she said holding it for everyone to see.

"But how can it be the same little girl I saw in the forest when she was taken away by some cousin?" Naruto asked confused.

"The article doesn't specify _where_ she was taken; there could be another house in this forest that we're unaware of" said Shikamaru.

"What I want to know is why the rest of the Kamakura's rejected that defenceless little girl, it's so cruel" said Jugo indignantly.

Sakura shook her head at them although she also wished to know what would cause a family to abandon one of their own innocent children. "I don't know but if you look at this picture that the girl could've drawn, there's so many people yelling at her and her mother with her crayon drawn blue tears and the picture comes after the picture of the weird looking entity that destroyed everything and before the picture of people yell at them. Which could mean that this woman we assume is Namiko Kamakura and her daughter were somehow implicated in the attack by these people drawn in before moving"

"But why move here, why move to such a godforsaken place such as this?" asked Ino.

"It's actually quite clear now that I think about it," said Shikamaru unaware that not everyone was not on his superior cognitive level, "Why would mother and daughter live in such an isolated place such as this? Think about it: the isolated location, trap doors, extra rooms, hidden passageways and not forgetting the paper bombs...It's highly likely they were protecting themselves or running away or hiding..." said Shikamaru.

"From what?" whispered Naruto.

"Whoever or whatever attacked the village or anything and anyone that threatened them. Just because people had blamed Namiko and her daughter for the attack, it doesn't mean that they were responsible for it; I'm betting that it was a false accusation. I mean _just look_ at this picture, this girl looks miserable and inflicted with pain and injustice"

None of them could deny that the picture of the girl with the terrible facial expression was unalarming, she looked ready to destroy the world.

Sakura stood where she was at the bookshelf and continued to search through some of the books she'd previously read during the genjutsu seal but searched them again now that their contents were no longer hidden.

She opened the book she'd previously read entitled 'White Lotus'. It appeared to be the only book that was written specifically by Namiko about personal accounts rather than poems for funerals. She read a poem entitled 'Snake in the Grass'

**'Snake in the Grass'**

_Like a moth to a flame_

_His servant came _

_Snake in the grass_

_Burning down the house _

_That parasitic louse_

_His master destroying the village_

_Looking to pillage_

_Why go after my gentle child_

_People of the Grass_

_No hearts_

_Told them where to find us_

-Namiko Kamakura.

Sakura believed she finally knew who the betrayers were that the rogue was targeting...People of the Grass Village who had exposed the location of their hidden house to some monster that eventually ended Namiko's life. But the poem was probably about her and her daughter...so how did the rogue ninja fit into the picture. Unless he was the distant cousin who had taken her in and helped the daughter seek revenge on the Grass village people for their betrayal by making them kill themselves. She thought back to the haiku '_betrayers of mine, I will surely bury you, you do seppuku' _

When she was finally convinced of the clue, she relayed the poem back to the group of ninja...

**9:38am**

The search continued for the group of ninja except for Suigetsu who looked overly pleased at chilling in the cold water while everyone else worked.

Ino searched through the pile of photos and drawings again then flipped through pages and pages of books until her eye caught something that was neatly slipped into one of the pages of a book.

"Here we go. I found another piece of the article. Someone must've torn it into bits to conceal it everywhere." she said handing it over to Sakura to read.

Sakura hungrily began reading the second bit of the article.

_-A local writer here in Kusagakure, Shiratori-sama, explained why the people of the Grass and the rest of the emigrated Kamakura's were unwilling to accept her as their own. _

"_I'm glad that that little girl is gone. Gave me the creeps, me and everyone in town. Good riddance to that whole family and now that the girl is gone, it means that the demon 'Snake in the Grass' will never come back here looking for her again. Her and that mother of hers" _

_When asked as to why they were glad that the girl was taken, no one wanted to answer; it had become a taboo subject in Kusa. _

_When further asked what the cousin looked like, one resident, Aomori-san, was quoted as saying "He had long slivery white hair tied up and a friendly smile. Oh and he also had round glasses. Said that he was her cousin from the Sound Village-"_

She looked at the newspaper clipping again closely. Sound Village. Sound Village. SOUND VILLAGE...It changed everything.

"I should've known...this girl; she was taken in by the only 'relative' who would take her in. Someone from the Sound Village with silvery white hair, round glasses and a smug looking grin on his face. Now _who_ does that sound like?" said Sakura sarcastically shaking her head.

Jugo, Kariin, Suigetsu and Sasuke looked at each other.

"Kabuto Yakushi" spat Sasuke in revulsion.

"That rat!" exclaimed Naruto. "What did he want with an innocent girl who just lost her mother?"

"Kabuto only ever did what Orochimaru told him. Orochimaru must've wanted the little girl for some reason" said Shikamaru.

"Of course! Orochimaru attacked the Grass Village..." said Sakura, "he could've been looking for her. The little girl. Think about the sequence of the pictures we assume were drawn by the little girl: She and her mother were living happily until a monster, in this case Orochimaru, destroyed everything. Then the picture of the many people yelling at her and her mother and the little girl drawing tears on her face they could be blaming the attack on the fact that Orochimaru had destroyed the village looking for her. Then the next picture, they were in a different grassy area. They could've moved to this house as Shikamaru said to get away from all the negativity."

"And if you think about all the hiding places in this house and all the paper bombs, it means that they were protecting themselves and hid themselves in case he ever came back looking for them," said Shikamaru, "The poem Sakura told us about entitled 'Snake in the Grass' tells it all. _Like a moth to a flame, his servant came, burning down the house, that parasitic louse. _That's it, Orochimaru sent his 'servant' Kabuto to come for the girl and her mother. He was the one who had burned down this house. Namiko and her daughter must've fled away into the forest for her to write this poem but eventually I think Kabuto found them and killed Namiko by Yoritomo Lake. Then he was under the pretext of being her distant cousin and took her to Orochimaru knowing that no one, including the Kamakura family now living in other lands, would take her in as they feared her"

They all nodded their heads in triumph. All the pieces of the puzzle were beginning to fit in nicely.

"One thing still can't fit; how does this link to the rogue if he wasn't the cousin who took her in?" asked Naruto, "and what are the special abilities of the little girl that would make Orochimaru to want to take her away?"

Sakura turned back to one of the books she'd read during the genjutsu, eager to find out what it really contained inside now that they were closer to the truth. 'Kunoichi on the Battlefield: A History of the Female ninja' was not blank on every page like it had been hidden. The pages were abundant with ninjutsu styles and forms of all the fire, water, air and earth styles.

"Who's to bet that the rogue copied these styles from this book?" Sakura asked flipping the book around for the others to see. Look at the real content of this book, there are so many genjutsu and ninjutsu techniques used by female ninja throughout the millennia. There's one for 'blinking speed' but none for body doubling." she said.

Sakura turned to the last page and noticed one jutsu in particular was written with an orange crayon. It was a genjutsu, the rogue ninja's specialty.

"Hey Sasuke, there's one genjutsu written in here with crayon. You're the only genjutsu type shinobi here, maybe you should try it" said Suigetsu peeking at the last page.

"You want me to try a jutsu we know nothing about written by some brat who once lived here being controlled by a freak?Written in crayon?" he asked incredulously. No one seemed to argue with him. He shook his head at their naivety.

"Okay hold the book upright so I do the jutsu properly" said Sasuke impatiently. He studied the page of its forms and readied to call the peculiar sounding jutsu.

"Ninja art: hide and seek" he said confidently.

Nothing. The group of ninja waited, anticipated, and looked carefully around the room...waiting.

Suigetsu's heart began to pound. His water sensitive skin could feel the water stirring slightly...

Nothing...

The silence that the jutsu hadn't worked was almost convincing until...

-DOOM... DOOM... DOOM-

Everyone's eyes shot straight up in alarm at the constant banging coming from the roof. Kariin began to shake violently. Sakura could feel her own hairs on her skin stiffening.

"Neji" whispered Tenten curling closer to him.

"On it. Byakugan" he scanned the roof and the entire house.

Nothing...

-DOOM...DOOM...DOOM-

"My byakugan doesn't see anything up there" he said surprisingly quite calm.

Kariin felt the intensely pressing power smack her body and she exclaimed in fear. "Ahhh! Oh my Goodness. I feel it," she whispered terrified, "I can definitely sense the chakra up there. This time it's for real and it's strong" she cried.

Sakura's mind went blank as she stood next to Naruto who was just about ready to pounce on anything that revealed itself.

"Nobody move, and be quiet" hissed Sasuke staring at the ceiling and holding his hands out.

It started with the wall. A message was being written on the wall.

Ino screamed. Shikamaru covered her mouth.

HIDE AND SEEK

HIDE AND SEEK

ALL I WANT IS YOUR BODY

"Calm down," said Sasuke stiffly, "he's just playing with us. It's a genjutsu-

-Sasuke was cut off. The genjutsu curse mark with the sickening scratches around his neck along with Jugo's...began to burn with a fire-like intensity.

Both Sasuke and Jugo fell onto the flooded wet floor...and began screaming in a tortured pain. Jugo's face began to change to a greyish colour and strange black markings appeared. Sasuke squirmed and writhed in agony.

The entire group of ninja turned to them alarmed. The shrill high pitched screaming they'd all known too well came from every corner of the house and began piercing their ears with its devastation. Sakura, Kariin and Ino screamed in terror. Naruto panicked not knowing what to do.

"SASUKE! BREAK THE GENJUTSU!" screamed Kariin holding onto Sasuke's hand to channel her own chakra for him to break the powerful jutsu.

Naruto also flew to Sasuke's side helping him to break the jutsu while Suigetsu and the rest of the Leaf ninja helped Jugo and his changing appearance... but before they could get there...

It all stopped.

The screaming, the torture the noise...stopped.

Sasuke and Jugo lay in the pool of water on the floor, heaving and breathing, trying to calm down. Sakura's eyes jumped around wildly; Jugo and Sasuke hadn't broken the genjutsu...it had been someone else.

Once the silence filled the room...They all heard a noise coming from the kitchen

Clap, clap, clap...

Sakura stiffened. Kariin wanted to run away. Naruto was ready to pounce...

The man had finally appeared in the living room...For the first time since their mission began, they were finally face to face.

He was wearing a gardeners overall. Brown. Dirty and blood stained. His ash-grey skin colour was sickening. The bloodied bandages on his shoulder unsightly, his blueing lips, as horrifying as his demonic looking red bloodshsot eyes and menacing face.

He clapped his hands and smiled.

"_You didn't do that jutsu properly but I must applaud you for getting this far. Well done, you got me the first round_." he said in a soft baritone drawl. Sakura felt her skin crawling in disgust.

The entire group of ninja backed up excluding Naruto who narrowed his eyes and balled up his fists. "You bastard!" he roared, "We're going to kill you then rescue the girl you're hiding!"

Sakura pulled Naruto back in fear knowing all too well that he was a jump straight in type of shinobi.

They all witnessed a frightening menacing gleam spark from the rogue ninja's eyes. "Is that so, well if you want to find Himiko, you're going to have to destroy me first!" he said with his voice rising in excitement.

"No problem!" yelled Naruto pulling out a kunai and rushing forward.

-No Naruto!" yelled Sakura but he'd already jumped towards the rogue ninja who'd moved out of the way. Sasuke jumped up from the water trying to match his speed and seized his katana while everyone advanced towards Naruto, Sasuke and the rogue.

Sakura swore under her breath; she wasn't ready for a fight...She hastily pulled out her medical kit and tore open the wrapping containing the poison syringe.

"_C'mon, hurry up_" she cried desperately in her head...She was able to free the poison syringe with its silvery liquid made by Lady fifth herself and positioned it carefully in her shaking hand.

"Calm down Sakura, calm down!" she said out loud. It was now or never...

"Shikamaru, shadow possession now!" she yelled.

Shikamaru did the handsigns and trapped the rogue as he was about to dodge one of Sasuke's katana swings.

Sakura had no time for hesitation. She ran towards him and stabbed the syringe into his soft flesh injecting him with a lethal concoction...

She stood back with the rest of the ninja group waiting for results of his crumbling body being eaten away.

Their jaws dropped. Shikamaru let go of his shadow possession in shock.

Nothing happened.

Once the rogue was free of Shikamaru's jutsu, he pulled the syringe out of his arm and threw it onto the flooded floor. He smiled and looked down at the weapons in their hands.

"_People will just never listen, will they? I clearly stated no knives allowed, unless you want to kill yourselves. I'm trying to be fair here._"

They looked at the weapons in their hands. Kunai knives.

Ino screamed and dropped her kunai fearing that he could use whatever jutsu he uses to make his victims kill themselves.

Then he looks at the ground and all their eyes followed.

They all notice that the ground was covered in water; he could use his seppuku jutsu to drown them.

Sakura was blank. The poison hadn't killed him...he was indestructible...

"_Now let's try this again. I'm it_" he barked; the minute he'd said his last word, he was almost out of sight. They couldn't allow him to escape again...They all gave chase this time running behind him.

They ran as fast as they could behind him as he skipped and jolted in delight and fun way ahead of them with the speed jutsu he'd learned from the 'kunoichi on the Battlefield' book. They were so fixated on finally catching him...they did not realise where they were headed outside...

"No don't go into the forest!" yelled Shikamaru but it was too late as they'd all flown into the treetops and right into the forest full of genjutsu.

**10:00 am**

It was early afternoon when the Taka-Leaf ninja team began their fruitless chase for the rogue who'd finally made an appearance in their midst.

But once again. He was out of sight. They should've known better.

"I think we lost him" came Ino as the group stopped running.

"Dammit!" exclaimed Naruto pounding his fists on a tree in frustration.

"Naruto you idiot," cried Sakura slapping his face, "When will you ever stop jumping in head first without thinking! You could've gotten us killed!"

Shikamaru came running behind the group. "Guys, we've got to get out of here, don't you realise where this is!" he cried.

They all looked around and realised their mistake. The forest. Playground for the hidden rogue ninja.

"C'mon quickl-

-SNAP-

Everyone's head looked around wildly; trees began falling one by one.

"Scatter!" yelled Jugo.

They all had no choice but to jump out of the way as more and more trees began falling... One by one became six by six as the trees piled and smashed on the snowed ground. The rogue had to be near.

They began to run... they began to separate from each other while trying to dodge falling trees...

Neji used his byakugan to scan the area hoping to find the chakra network before it disappeared. The momentary distraction of using his byakugan left him unawares of a tree falling behind him. He saw it and jumped out of the way...too late.

The thick snowed leafless tree fell on top of his foot.

He yelled out in agony.

"Wait, I'm stuck. Tenten!" he yelled but nobody could hear him through the chaos of falling trees and the scramble to get out of the forest...

**11:00 am**

Mid-afternoon. The ferocious wind of the snowstorm had completely vanished.

Neji Hyuuga was alone in the forest.

A giant thick tree had collapsed on top of his right leg. He breathed and tried to calm himself from the pain of his crushed foot and all the chaos. The other's would probably only notice he was missing when they were out of the forest.

But he was relatively calm, as always. The situation was more than he could handle.

He took one deep breath before clutching his right leg and pulling on it to dislodge it from under the tree... It was excruciating. He yelled out in pain as he heaved and tugged his leg out. Finally with great difficulty his leg was freed.

He breathed and sighed. It felt like the bone had been crushed, as exaggerated as it seemed. He massaged his painful foot before pulling himself up to balance on his left leg. It would take him forever to get out the forest if none of the Leaf came back for him. For motivational purposes, he just pictured the kunoichi on his team with the soft brown eyes, brown hair and the silly smile as he took a step.

He stopped immediately. But not from the overbearing pain...

Someone was standing a few metres behind him.

Neji had anticipated this, but not the injury. He stood no chance.

He forced his petrified body to turn around slowly...slowly...

The smell of blood and sweat. The thick rope tied in a noose in his hands. The evil face.

Neji felt sick as his body turned to stone, but he couldn't allow himself to be killed on a mission in the barbaric nature of seppuku.

Neji took a step with his left leg. The rogue didn't move behind him.

Neji began hopping on one leg to get away from him.

The rogue ninja took a step and began walking forward slowly...slowly.

Neji had no choice but to use his painful leg. He cried out in desperation as pain seared through his right foot. He stumbled, limped and trudged about the snow trying to get away.

The quiet rogue ninja behind him sped up his walking pace. Until they both stopped at a faint noise was heard calling from nearby.

"Neji! Neji where are you?"

Hope at last. They had discovered that he was missing and had come back to find him. He could gladly hear it was Tenten's breaking voice.

"TE—

Neji choked and gagged as he was stopped from yelling by the thick rope squeezing the air from his throat. Stars flickered in his wide eyes as the noose tightened around his neck.

The rogue ninja tugged on the rope from behind causing Neji to fall on the snowed ground.

He had very little breath left to call out to the ninja just a few trees away from them now. He extended his hand out and groped the air in desperation. They were so close.

The rogue ninja pulled the rope and dragged Neji Hyuuga ever deeper into the unknown snowed forest...

X

"Neji!" screamed Tenten with her voice breaking and tears swimming in her eyes; it was all her fault. She should've never let him out of her sight especially since he'd been named as a target.

"Don't worry Neji's strong, He can handle anything that the rogue does to him" said Shikamaru as Sakura placed her hands around Tenten who wasn't convinced. She looked on the brink of collapse.

"Kariin," came Sasuke agitated, "Do you fell anyth-

"Over there!" she yelled suddenly pointing to a nearby row of trees. "Wait, it disappeared again." she said.

"Sakura, Ino, Tenten and Naruto stay here," Shikamaru instructed, "Everyone else come quickly before-

...The sound of snow crunching nearby was heard approaching them. The all looked around alertly...

Neji Hyuuga stumbled out of the shadow of a nearby tree towards the group.

Tenten heaved a sigh and broke out of Sakura's arms to throw herself into Neji's arms. Neji looked pleasantly surprised.

"Woah there, Tenten. What's wrong?" he asked.

"I thought...I thought he got to you. The rogue." she sniffed burying her head in his chest. She was deeply traumatised.

"Don't worry, I just got a little lost in the chaos but I'm fine now. I was lucky this time"

"What happened to your foot?" asked Ino watching him stumbling off balance.

"I must've sprained it when I was running away from the falling trees" he said casually.

"Everyone. Let's get back to the house before he shows up again" said Shikamaru.

Tenten and Ino helped Neji walk as they all exited the forest back to the house.

The second the get back to the house Sakura took Kariin by the collar of her Akatsuki robe and pulled her right up to her face.

"Kariin, for the last time, who is he? I know you know! Tell us or nobody is coming out here alive, including you Taka" said Sakura.

"She's an information specialist Sakura," said Sasuke, "It's not in her nature to divulge classified information"

"An information specialist, are you kidding me? Do you think that fact is going to save all of us-

"-He was one of Orochimaru's test subjects" said Kariin finally. Sakura finally let her go as all stunned eyed were now on Kariin.

"How do you know that?" Shikamaru demanded.

"I worked at a prison or holding cell for Orochimaru's test subjects. He wasn't located at my facility but somewhere else. I remember when word broke out of a prison escape I was given a list, pictures and the number of escapees to try and locate them. He was one of the escapees that we never found. Hayashi Fukazawa."

The information left them all reeling. It appeared that not even the Taka had known this from her. But a thought clicked in Shikamaru's mind; his last name was Fukazawa...not Kamakura, but Orochimaru proved to be the only link between the two thus far.

"So the whole bit about being a gardener was a lie." said Suigetsu knowing Kariin's knack to manipulate information.

"No. It could've been his cover while staying here." she said remembering the logo on his clothing.

"We're assuming once again that Kabuto took the little girl to Orochimaru and as Kariin just said, Hayashi Fukazawa was imprisoned as one of the many people entrapped as Orochimaru's prisoners. They could've met there" said Sasuke.

"I don't remember seeing any little girl in my prison. But then again, Hayashi wasn't kept where I worked, I'd only heard about him when it was too late to capture him as he escaped"

"How long ago did he escape?" asked Shikamaru.

"Two years ago"

"That's probably when he came to Grass Village to terrorise and make people commit suicide here in the Grass Village on behalf of the little girl who'd been accused for Orochimaru's attack." said Shikamaru.

"No. The little girl wanted revenge on the people of the Grass because they'd betrayed her and her mother's location, this house, to Kabuto." said Sakura remembering the poems 'Snake in the Grass' and the haiku about seppuku.

Sakura stared at her. "C'mon Kariin, you know the most about him, we need to find out as much as we can from the books left behind here. There a link between this Hayashi Fukazawa 'the rogue ninja' and the little girl who used to live here. If we find out about this little girl we can find out about the rogue ninja.

"He called her Himiko. Himiko Kamakura." said Neji as Ino healed his broken foot.

It was starting to feel like cat and mouse chasing games, they needed to find and finish him. But Shikamaru had only just wondered something scary.

"Wait a second. Why didn't the poison work, this mission should be done by now! I'm so sick of this" he asked.

The group of ninja just stared at each other. Sakura could feel the terrifying truth creeping up on them.

"I thought about that too. There's only one explanation that the poison syringe didn't work."Hayashi Fukazawa is already dead."

They all looked around confused at each other...

"The girl, Himiko, she's using a reanimation jutsu?" whispered Naruto as Sakura nodded.

"That doesn't make sense. Why would Orochimaru want to kidnap a girl to obtain powers from her that he already has?" asked Shikamaru.

"I guess we'd better keep searching then. We're so near to the truth, I can feel it" said Sakura.

**11:00am**

After several hours of searching and late afternoon approaching, the whole group was exhausted and most had abandoned the search to take a break as they were beyond their wits. The only person continuing was Sakura who'd found a place in the corner of the room and had taken the burned stool and sat on it to avoid sitting in the water. She scanned every poem and piece of text she could find then she opened up the map of the Grass Village as Naruto came up to her.

"Any luck Sakura?" he asked smiling at her. She looked up at him. Nobody was as effervescent as Naruto Uzumaki; he always had extra strength to carry on.

"Well I found Yoritomo Lake, located a couple miles from this house. So Namiko and her daughter were living in this house when Kabuto came looking for them and they fled the house and hid in the forest before he found them and killed Namiko then took her daughter."

Naruto shook his head at the injustice.

Sakura looked carefully at the map until something caught her eye. "Hey look Naruto, Tenchi Bridge. It's only a couple of miles from here," she said genuinely surprised, "I can't actually believe that we've been to this area before without realising. The Grass Village."

"Oh yeah, I remember, it was our first mission with Captain Yamato and Sai. It's probably why Kabuto and Orochimaru knew this place so well, since they'd once come here to attack the Kamakura's"

They both smiled at each other for a second remembering team Kakashi...

Meanwhile Shikamaru sat on the nearly burned into oblivion couch and stared at the ceiling to gather his thoughts when a burned out Ino came up to sit next to him.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm just trying to think...this rogue _has_ to have a weakness, everyone does" he whispered.

"What are we going to do though once we leave here? Naruto won't allow Sasuke to escape here without another fight." she said concerned.

"We can easily restrain Naruto if he acts alone. But if Sakura helps him 'bring Sasuke back' then we'll be out of luck. We'll have to see how many of us Leaf ninja are still willing to fight for him." said Shikamaru.

Ino took one sweeping look from the corner of her eyes to the other side of the room where Sasuke was talking amongst the Taka.

"I couldn't care less about Sasuke Uchiha." she shrugged simply.

"Really?" said Shikamaru surprised; Ino was the one who always fought, drooled and fawned over him.

"Yeah. He was the most popular boy at The Academy because he was so cool and mysterious not to mention hotter above any other boy. "

"Thanks-" joked Shikamaru.

"-But he's changed somehow and betrayed the Leaf Village. Sakura and Naruto are the only people who still fight for him anymore, he's their problem now"

"What if it were me? What if I'd left the village seeking revenge on someone who killed someone close to me?"

"You already did remember; when you, me, Choji and Kakashi sensei went after the two Akatsuki who robbed us of our sensei. But you weren't obsessed with doing it alone and by the wrong means by betraying your village.

"That's true. But none of us really know what Sasuke's been through in his life so we can't really judge him, you know. Not that I've ever liked the guy."

"For what it's worth, I would've never given up on you just as Sakura and Naruto haven't given up on him"

Ino gave one quick look back at Sasuke then turned back to Shikamaru.

"What do you think Choji would be doing right now?" she whispered softly.

"Complaining that he didn't get enough to eat."

She chortled and shook her head. "You're right, maybe it's a good thing that he isn't here then or we'd have run out of stored food already." She looked away in the momentary silence until...

"Ino?"

"Yes Shikamaru?"

"I'm sorry"

"For what?"

"For failing you and everyone here. I know how much all you believe in my leadership and now were in this mess because of me. This mission is a stone's throw away from being a complete fail."

She looked at him surprised; Shikamaru had long since matured past feeling down on his confidence. He'd grown up once their sensei had died, stepped up because of the responsibility left to him.

"Shut up Shikamaru; I don't want to hear it. You were chosen by the Hokage as leader of this mission for a reason despite not being the highest ranked as Neji is. That means people in high places in Konoha have confidence in your abilities. That doesn't happen by mistake. Listen...the only reason I'm not picking fights with Sakura right now just to feel better about myself is because you're here. I know we can finish this mission, we haven't failed. I always feel safe when you're made team leader. You're a genius…and I know that Asuma sensei would be proud of you just like me and Choji" she placed her hand on his lap.

He turned to her and placed his hand on top of hers squeezing it tight.

"Thanks Ino" he whispered smiling from the corner of his mouth with her returning his smile.

Both didn't realise how the quiet and tired haze of the house was so comforting. Both didn't realise until their faces leaned in closer to each other…

They both took a moment to stare at each other.

He brushed her fringe aside; he never got the chance to see her full face because of the waterfall fringe always in her face. But now as they leaned closer to each other he realised how perfectly alien blue her sparkly eyes were. Their foreheads collided; noses touched slightly, blank stares firmly locked onto the blue and brown. It happened so quickly yet slowly that they were caught up in the moment, holding each other's cheeks…until the alarming sound of an enormous hardcover four hundred page book slamming its pages made them both jump apart and come back to their senses.

"Oh excuse me; I just dropped this thick book. My bad" came Sakura giving her best fake smile she'd learned from another replacement member of team Kakashi to the other ninja who had turned around to check on the commotion. Naruto had been trying to zero in on Sasuke's conversation with the Taka, so he'd missed the happening. An outraged Sakura was the only one who'd seen it. At such a time and place...they had found time to kiss each other.

For Ino and Shikamaru the moment was over, reality came back in a snap and it was time for realisation. Shikamaru looked back at Ino whose now strategically placed fringe was back in her face; she did not dare to look back at him but stared at the flooded ground feeling embarrassed. Shikamaru stood up and walked away pulling out a smoke from his pocket and Asuma's lighter to relieve the guilt and confusion of realising that he'd cheated on his real girlfriend.

Sakura watched Shikamaru walk away satisfied.

"Hey Ino can I have a word with you?" asked Sakura.

"What do you want billboard brow, I'm busy" she said annoyed.

"I shouldn't have to remind you that this is still a mission. None of the rules have changed. We can't get carried away in certain situations just because were away from everyday realities. Don't take advantage of this situation." she said trying not to be too direct but Ino insisted.

Ino sighed impatiently. "Would you please be more specific?"

"Shikamaru has a girlfriend; back off him" she scolded.

Ino looked embarrassed and angry. "Who gave you the right to play judge? It was a mistake anyway."

"I mean it. Temari will tear every strand of hair off your pretty little head one by one" Ino looked at her fearfully; she had a spiteful gleam in her eyes with her unkind words and her tight grip.

She looked down at the tight grip then at Sakura then pulled herself free and walked away.

Meanwhile outside...

Tenten walked outside towards Neji standing on the porch like a watchmen.

"Neji, what are you doing out here by yourself? It's not safe, especially for you." she whispered. He remained silent but turned to stare blankly at her.

"I'm sorry for leaving you behind in the forest earlier, there was so much going on you know?"

"That's okay, it actually helped me get a better scope of the forest you know." he said grabbing her shoulder and pulling her closer.

"That's great. The sooner we find out what the rogue's weakness is, the quicker we can find and eliminate him. Are you okay though?" she asked staring him in his eyes.

"I am now" he whispered. Tenten looked up at him and blushed as his face inched closer to hers.

Before she could think further, his soft lips were on hers. only after a few seconds did she break away from him.

"Neji, what are you doing?" she whispered blushing and trying hard to pretend she didn't enjoy it.

"What do you mean? I thought you loved me?" he said blankly. Her jaw dropped at his bold question and her cheeks flushed an even brighter red.

"Wha...I never said...I mean not like..." she murmured caught off guard but Neji pulled his face back towards hers and kissed her again. This time...more aggressively.

Tenten noticed immediately and tried to push him off her but he wouldn't budge.

"Neji! Stop it, get off me!" she fought to push him away as he grew ever more aggressive.

Tenten stopped immediately when she realised that his hand was around her throat.

She only needed one second to scream...

Too late...

Neji's hand tightened around her throat as she gasped for breath and tried to fight him off. Her movements were too slow and breath diminishing until she passed out...

Neji dragged a limp Tenten down the patio and placed her in an undiscovered trapdoor under the patio stairs, then he used a genjutsu to conceal her body. He walked back up the stairs to see someone else coming outside.

Shikamaru walked outside to light one up when his foot hit something. He looked down at it. It was an ugly unkempt doll with long blond hair and brown eyes. The doll had dishevelled hair with a dirty faded floral dress. Then he had a thought. It appeared to be the same doll in the picture of the rogue ninja.

He was about to go back inside to show the others when Neji came up to him from the stairs.

"What's that you've got there?" Neji asked casually.

"It's the doll from the picture. Remember the picture we saw of the rogue with a doll in his pocket?"

"Why would anyone _ever_ leave something like this here?" asked Neji. Shikamaru looked at Neji; to him it sounded more like a question of sadness than confusion.

Shikamaru placed Asuma's lighter and the cigarette back into his pocket and bent down. The moment Shikamaru picked up the doll he felt something sliding down his nose.

Blood.

"Your nose is bleeding" said Neji calmly walking up to him.

Shikamaru realised but it was too late. Neji picked him up by the throat as Shikamaru was halfway through doing his shadow possession hand signs and smashed his head repeatedly against the wooden wall...knocking him out.

Neji dragged his body to the same hidden trapdoor under the patio stairs where Tenten was lying unconscious...

**A/N: By now you should have a pretty good idea about what's going on...Anyway finally, the last chapter is next, or at least I hope so...but if it is, I promise that I'll explain everything including the time not matching up the descriptions and etc. **


	6. Chapter 6: hide and Seek

**Chapter 6: hide and Seek**

**A/N: Sorry this chapter took so long, I was going through what we varsity students call 'death weeks part: 1 and part 2' where we're pretty much overworked to the death by assessments for a few weeks before we can qualify for finals...But anyway shout out to GOLDENPIGGY for always being Right On the Money as the pseudonym suggests for guessing correctly...**

**11:00 am**

Flip...scan...flip... scan. Tick...tock...tick tock...

Page after page after page after page…

With the loud ticking of the wall clock disturbing her mind, Sakura sat on a black stool drowning in a pile of books from the shelf in the tense living room full of unoccupied and restless ninja. Her soft pink hair gently brushed against the dry pages of the unburned books she'd been sifting through relentlessly. She felt her head waning as the neverending wave of books came crashing on her lap as Naruto handed them to her from the shelf. She was their last hope; hope of finding out any weakness of the rogue ninja using the resourceful books like she had after the breakthrough of other poems.

She kept her tired eyes firmly fixed on the pages not wanting to even look anyone in the eye, not even by accident as she didn't want to let them down. Especially someone like Naruto who stopped handing her books to chance a hopeful glance in her direction now and again, checking on her progress. Unbeknownst to him, he was only making the matter worse by applying unnecessary pressure on her. Everybody was.

"_C'mon_ Sakura, what's taking so long this time. I thought you had this figured out. We're losing the light and we need to finish this so we can finally get out this dump" stressed Sasuke shooting an impatient glare of at her while he leaned his elbow on Kariin shoulder, delighting her to no end. Sakura tried to ignore the offense.

"Would you just give me a sec. It's not like anyone else could do this" she said through gritted teeth.

Sakura pinched her eyes closed for a second fearing that she'd failed everyone. She didn't have the heart to tell all the worn out ninja who'd just about had enough of everything, that there was no more evidence in any of the books she'd read, not especially since Sasuke was so adamant on her not screwing up...she knew that his approval of her abilities still mattered to her. But no one was going home until a weakness of the rogue ninja was found so he could be eliminated.

An impasse. Fustration.

She continued to sift through the pages as she heaved a sigh and placed a hand on her throbbing head in frustration. The pounding in her head seemed to come alive when she realised that it was actually coming from somewhere else as a banging sound...from outside. It couldn't be the rogue ninja; she wasn't ready yet, she hadn't found a weakness but welcomed the distraction.

"Naruto would you just wait here for a second, I'll be right back" she said throwing the books in his hands as she stood up.

Splash.

Sakura looked down at the floor felling uneasy. The water streaming from the bathroom was creating a serious flood of the house now as the water reached her ankle.

"Where are you going now?" asked Kariin impatiently. Sakura shot a nasty glance at her before turning back to the front door staring at it carefully trying to figure out what the noise could be.

She reached out for the doorknob and turned it slightly before it was suddenly twisted open and pushed towards her from outside.

Neji Hyuuga pushed the door open and almost knocked her off balance as he hastily came inside. He gazed blankly at her. She looked at him in mild surprise as she was caught unawares; he knew that he was being targeted by the rogue yet he had been outside by himself.

"Oh Sakura, I apologise for that-

"It's okay Neji; erm did something happen to you just now?"

"No, why do you ask?" he said quietly.

"I heard erm…nothing never mind, anyway you shouldn't even be outside by yourself knowing that you've been targeted by the rogue." she scolded.

"Then...would you like to step outside with me for a moment? I would like to discuss the misunderstandings we had between us during this mission and how we can fix our teamwork for future assignments. I'll close the door so we can speak in private." he asked extending his hand out eagerly to her and taking one step back from the threshold.

Sakura raised an eyebrow at him while looking at his hand reaching out to her; as much as she wanted the opportunity to make amends after their damaging infighting, Neji had never been this considerate to her before nor had he ever asked for her to take his hand in his. She looked at him relaxing his fixated gaze. As she was about to take his hand and step outside, curious about what he really wanted from her, Naruto's loud voice boomed at her from inside.

"Sakura, I don't know how much longer I can hold these books." cried Naruto from inside struggling to balance the books. Sakura turned back to Neji after rolling her eyes at Naruto's whining.

"Sorry about this Neji, let's just go back inside; it'll have to wait for after the mission."

He stared at her for longer than could be appreciated. Before she was able to get confused, he said "You're right." and walked back inside.

As she stepped aside to allow Neji to walk inside first, she noticed something that made her tilt her head in surprise. Neji's glorious dark hair which had always been characteristically tied near the bottom, was now tied at the centre of the back of his head, similar to Ino's hairstyle; it made him look more feminine.

Everyone watched as Neji followed by Sakura walked back inside the house. Ino stared at the door for a few seconds when both Neji and Sakura walked in before a frown appeared on her face.

"You know what, there's no use pretending that any progress has been made. I'm sorry guys but...I can't find any more evidence in these books." Sakura announced as she stood by the wall shaking her head.

A hum and grumble of frustration chorused through the house, mainly by the Taka team. Sasuke balled up his fist in annoyance.

"What's the point of you being here if you aren't able to make any important difference when we're trying to actually _kill_ the rogue? That was your mission wasn't it?" Sasuke spat harshly.

Ino stood up from the burned couch and walked into the kitchen, scanning the place from left to right. Then she walked to the bathroom, ignoring everyone's griping and arguing back and forth, then walked down the new corridor and slid open the doors to look inside.

"...Then why did you rescue me huh? From that beast yesterday? You should've just let it kill me to get me out of the way if you think I'm such deadweight." yelled Sakura feeling insulted as Ino walked passed them not taking anything in.

"That's only because I saw the medical cross on your backpack so I figured that you were a medical ninja and we Taka would need your training. That's the only reason, seems to me that you're as one dimensional as ever." he said harshly.

Sakura felt the sting of his words. She'd forgotten that Sasuke's attitude was the same hurtful selfish person that had constantly hampered former team seven's teamwork. Just to think that she'd thought Sasuke cared about her enough to save her life, but it had been a matter of her usefulness, as always.

"Sasuke you jerk. Sakura can destroy an entire forest with her fist if she wanted. Besides, it's not her fault. What are we supposed to do if we can't find anything?" yelled Naruto.

"Consider this ridiculous mission a fail and leave this place since the storm is long over. Come back when you are better prepared and with proper backup. " said Sasuke. Sakura sank back into her stool next to Naruto. She looked at Naruto; he seemed reluctant to give up, it wasn't in his nature after all. Not to mention she didn't want to appear as a failure to Sasuke and prove him right. Neji stood silently behind Sakura watching them all intently.

"Shikamaru?" Ino called out in the hallway to nothing opening and slamming the doors of all the rooms fruitlessly.

She turned around and walked back to the group of ninja contemplating to end their mission as unsuccessful. The last time she'd seen him was after her initial embarrassment of being swept up in the moment with him and she'd heard him…walk out the door as she'd heard the door close.

Ino walked past unnoticed by the group of ninja and splashing her way through the length of the room making a beeline towards the door hastily opening it.

Nothing and no one.

She shook her head as a panic sparked inside her; she scanned the entire room of people. From Sakura asking to talk to Naruto privately in the kitchen while pulling him there by his orange sleeve, to the four team Taka members rolling their impatient eyes in frustration to...Neji. He shifted his gaze when he made eye contact with Ino who narrowed her eyes at him.

Sakura pulled Naruto by his sleeve into the kitchen trying to think of what to say to him if they did have to abandon their mission. And what to do when they leave...with regards to Sasuke. She turned a stubborn Naruto around to look at him.

"Naruto, maybe Sasuke's right about this-". She stopped talking when something inside the kitchen cupboard caught your attention. Sakura eyes grew wide at the sight of the set of dishes that had appeared during the genjutsu phase of their house experience. They had reappeared.

"What, what is it Sakura?" asked Naruto seeing her shocked face.

"They're back," she whispered "...These dishes weren't here when we got to this house. They appeared under a genjutsu, which means that the rogue is trying to say something to us..." she trailed off as she counted all the sets. Previously there had consisted of eleven or 'ereben' representing the ten shinobi of the Leaf and Taka in the house and the one rogue ninja.

Her heart beat faster when the numbers didn't add up to eleven.

Two sets were missing...

Back in the living room, Ino brushed her long blonde fringe out of her face as she marched up to the only present jonin.

"Where's Shikamaru?" she demanded from Neji.

"What are you talking about? How should I know?" asked Neji furrowing his brows and slightly narrowing his eyes at her in mild surprise. Ino never took her penetrating blue stare off his implicitly defiant transparent eyes; his challenging gaze provoked and stirred a monster inside her.

"You're lying Neji!" she yelled in such a fiery intolerance so loud that it alarmed the rest of the group and also prompted Sakura and Naruto to walk back into the living room.

"What's going on here?" Sakura asked afraid of the answer especially after what she and Naruto had just seen.

"Shikamaru's missing and Neji's done something to him!" yelled Ino.

"Wait—Shikamaru? Wasn't...he..." Sakura trailed off about to say 'outside'. The Leaf ninja knew more than anything that someone as smart as Shikamaru would never stay outside by himself for such a long period of time knowing what they were dealing with.

Naruto gasped when he noticed. "Then where is he?" he whispered.

"Wait a second" Sakura whispered as a disturbing thought entered her mind. She rushed to the bookshelf and threw open the book entitled: Broken Pieces of Sliver. The familiar and once vague poem about dishes was still written in the book.

Under a new description...

_Nine spoon_

_Nine cups_

_Nine plates_

_No one eating _

_No knife allowed _

Her racing heart skipped a beat as a familiar sickening feeling numbed her body. She couldn't believe it. She dropped the book in the water on the floor. The poem had changed to represent the new number of people in the house. There was still a genjutsu placed on them. She prayed that it didn't mean terrible news for Shikamaru.

"What have you found?" asked Sasuke sounding alarmed now.

"Naruto and I just saw all those dishes that had appeared under the genjutsu in the kitchen. But two sets are gone now from the original eleven, which means that nine people are still remaining in the house including the rogue ninja..." she whispered frozen, "Thee must be one more person. Shikamaru and..."

They scanned the living room trying to spot anyone missing.

"Tenten!" yelled Naruto incredulously.

Ino's hand shot to her mouth as they realised that two members of the Leaf team had been taken right under their noses. She shook her head at the insanity; people were being snatched without them even knowing, it was so reckless for them to notice immediately...

"We're being watched!" she gasped to the rest of the frantic ninja as Sasuke and his Team Taka stopped to look at her.

"You," Ino spat suddenly pointing a finger accusingly at Neji, "You must be the rogue!" she yelled chest heaving and falling in the pre-hysteria. Ino kept her acidic blue eyes firmly locked on Neji's calm stare. Sasuke, Suigetsu, Jugo and Kariin all turned to stare at Ino and her commotion with Neji who kept silent.

"What are you talking about Ino, calm down. The rogue is no longer pretending to be one of us remember? We already exposed that he was pretending to be Naruto earlier." said Sakura taken aback by her hysteria.

"No! Neji is the rogue ninja and he's taken Shikamaru somewhere. Neji was the only other person outside yet he's the only one that came back." she yelled in a higher pitch at him and stared him down. She took out a kunai knife as eyes around the room grew wider at the sudden and looming confrontation. She started gaining on him. Sakura rushed towards her and she and Naruto pulled her back and away from Neji.

"WHERE HAVE YOU TAKEN HIM? I'LL KILL YOU!" she screamed hair flying and whipping as she lost all control, still trying to get to him with her ninja weapon but was being restrained by the two team Kakashi Leaf ninja.

"Let me go! Now! It's him. IT'S HIM! He's taken Shikamaru." she screamed panicking as she was being pulled away. Sakura covered Ino's mouth shaken by the paranoia that she'd just witnessed from Ino. Kariin was also shocked at something else...if the brainiac from the Leaf team was missing along with the girl who'd nearly drowned, then how had the number of chakra she felt remained constant?

"Quickly, everyone look around for signs of a struggle," yelled Sakura holding onto Ino.

"We won't have to; I can still feel the same number of chakra around me. It's foggy but it's definitely in this house. It must mean that the rogue is only able to hide his own chakra"

"Can you tell us where they are?" begged Ino.

"Not exactly, and that's what scares me" she said apprehensively looking at Sasuke knowing that she was always able to pinpoint where chakra was coming from.

"This house isn't that big, there are only a number of places they could be," said Sasuke turning on his sharingan and scanning the room when he noticed the bogus time on the wall, "By the way, ignore the time on that clock. The real time will only be revealed once all this is over"

**5:10 pm**

Ino was the first one to run; she ran towards the trapdoor in the hallway and pried it open with one swift tug and was already making her way through. Everyone else followed after her. From what they had discovered, all the trapdoors and hidden passageways were somehow interconnected so she would have to run through the place like a maze. She never stopped as she called out Shikamaru's name. Sakura watched Ino panicking sadly; it was all a blur to her while exchanging glances with Naruto as millions of thoughts circled her head in a panic. Losing one of their most valuable people, not to mention loyal friend was not an option. She hoped against everything that the last place they would need to look would be the dreaded forest.

The ninja group checked every pore of the hidden passageways looking for any sign to indicate what might have happened to Shikamaru and Tenten.

"Wait," came Sasuke looking with his sharingan, "There's a trapdoor here that can only be seen by a genjutsu type shinobi. It's hidden here" he said kicking a trapdoor embedded inside the wall of one of the hidden passageways and a step ladder reaching down to the ground to which they climbed down.

A dark and damp room was lying right underneath the house. The room emitted a powerful putrid stench even as cold air filtered inside. They had never seen the place before.

"Feel that cold air, there must be another way to get into this room" said Jugo walking in carefully with the rest of the ninja group.

"And this _smell_, something's got to be in here." said Suigetsu pinching his nose and standing next to Sasuke.

"Naruto, you know what to do." said Sasuke looking at Naruto knowingly. Naruto smacked his hands tightly mustering up as much chakra as he could. The room began swirling slowly but even Naruto couldn't break it completely. Slowly as the room swirled a portion of the reality of the room became evident.

A mahogany table...Ino held her breath in hope...

Something covered in a white sheet lying on the mahogany table with its head exposed...

A body...

The group of ninja gasped in sickened revulsion when they saw it...Ino almost fainted in relief when she realised it wasn't Shikamaru or Tenten lying dead before them. Instead...

The ashen faced body of a young woman whose skin had long since been stripped of its natural colour was lying on the table.

Sakura stepped closer to the body along with the rest of the shocked and sickened ninja. She didn't feel as squirmish being a medical ninja having to deal with sick and sometimes deceased patients. She felt her jaw drop when she realised that she'd seen the woman before only in pictures...

"Namiko Kamakura." she whispered staring at the lifeless face of the once smiling funeral poet, women and mother. A sense of grief wiped through her; she felt like she knew Namiko, having shared a piece of her life by reading her personal thoughts, accounts in her books.

"Who? How do you know who this is?" asked Naruto recoiling.

"She was the woman who used to live here. According to the first torn piece of the newspaper article I found, her body was never found by Grass Village authorities after she drowned in Yoritomo Lake. Now we know why. Her body was here all along."

The body of Namiko Kamakura seemed to freak Ino out as she feared the same fate for Shikamaru. She backed up breathing rapidly and clutching her hair in stress.

"Ino calm down okay, well find him and Tenten somewhere in this house. Kariin said that she can still feel their chakra so they're still alive okay." said Sakura holding onto Ino's shoulders.

Ino tried her best to calm down at Sakura's reassuring words. "Sakura," she breathed, "I'm sorry for acting like a spoilt brat yesterday when I wanted to heal Shikamaru alone. I just wanted him to know that I can be of use to him and take care of him you know." she whispered.

"Ino, I think that Shikamaru already knows that, both he and Choji, but if something did happen, you have to understand that it's not your fault" she said.

"Yes it is! I was entrusted by Asuma sensei to always take care of him... I _promised _Asuma as his dying wish. What am I going to say to Choji, Kurenai sensei, to his parents?" What am I supposed to say to Asuma?" she cried as her voice threatened to break, momentarily unaware that their team ten sensei was no longer with them.

Sakura had no idea what to say to her, she was on the fringes of insanity. Her eyes shifted to the too quiet Leaf ninja standing by the table but not daring to look at it, with his lack of concern for his own missing teammate quite unmistakeable.

Sakura looked closer at Neji and noticed a purple ring around his neck that appeared to be a bruise. She remembered what the Suigetsu and Jugo guys of the Taka had said. When the rogue ninja was pretending to be Naruto, he'd tried using some of Naruto's jutsu and failed by falling to the ground and yelling in pain. If their theory was correct then it meant that Neji wouldn't be able to use his kekkei genkai.

"Hey Neji would you mind just using your byakugan to scan through the area to make sure that you can't see any chakra?" she asked innocently enough.

"Sure let me check back in the hidden passageway so I can get a better view." he said about to walk away.

"But there's no need...I mean you can see through the walls with a wide radius isn't it? Just turn on your byakugan." she said trying to come across as casual.

He stared at Sakura in the somewhat awkward silence as they all looked at him waiting for him to follow the instruction.

"I don't want to be here," whispered Jugo backing up and shaking his head; the vividness and rawness of seeing a dead body reminded him uncomfortably about his troubled past of killing people, "I don't want to hang around corpses".

He walked out of the room as the rest of the group followed along with Naruto behind Sasuke's team and Neji left giving one final glance at the two Leaf kunoichi before heading out. Sakura cursed in her head as they left without the two Leaf ninja; if it hadn't been for Jugo's distraction, she would've probed Neji further.

Ino ran out of the room back to the hidden passageways and out the trapdoor into the house again to continue the search for Shikamaru and Tenten. As they reached the hallway of the seven rooms, their frantic search effort was slowed down by Sasuke when they reached the living room as his pseudo curse mark began to burn. He yelled out in pain clutching his shoulders while everyone turned to him as he cried out in the incapacitating pain.

"Sasuke let me heal you quickly," said Sakura bending down to get a look of his nasty wound and curse mark created by the genjutsu. "Ino, Naruto, guys, go ahead, Sasuke and I will catch up"

"Okay, guys let's move" said Naruto fired up and ready for action.

"Let's go Kariin, you're the important person in this search" said Ino grabbing her arm and treating her like a human radar.

"Sasuke, are you okay?" she asked as she led him into one of the previously hidden seven rooms nearby.

"Yeah it was just a genjutsu as always." he said lying on the floor of one of the seven rooms which were thankfully dry.

"Don't get up; I've got a healing gel in my backpack. I'll go get it for you" said Sakura quickly running out to the living room to fetch her medical backpack.

When the group ran away to continue their search; Neji who tagged along from behind, slowed his pace so he could fall behind. The rest of the group were too preoccupied with their search to notice him fall behind on purpose and leave to an unknown location.

**5:46 pm**

Sasuke was lying on his side on the dry tatami floor of one of the rooms in the house waiting for Sakura to return to heal his shoulder when all the pain had subsided except for tiny prickles now and then. He stared at the white wall when the hairs on his arms began to shift uncomfortably:

"_Sasuke…" _

He sat up and froze when he heard someone's voice...Sasuke shook his head as a nauseatingly ferocious hatred boiling inside him when the same genjutsu used on Neji Hyuuga was employed against him. Family: An unacceptable line that should never be crossed, especially in his case...

His mother's voice.

"_Sasuke, my little boy, where are you_?"

He began shaking as the depravity for bloodlust of the rogue threatened to consume him...hearing the voice he hadn't heard, that he yearned for, for too long compelled him to get up. Mikoto Uchiha's voice echoed throughout the room. He didn't want to get others involved. Clearly the rogue wanted him alone using such personal entices. A door leading to the outside appeared under the genjutsu. Sasuke did not hesitate for a second, he wanted to punish the evil rogue, and he knew it had to be the forest. He was led out of the house...

He drew out his katana begging for a fight to release all the anger...

...Meanwhile Sakura returned with her healing gel from her medical backpack and walked back to the room.

"Hey Sasu—

It took a few seconds for her to realise that the room was empty. She did a double take and looked around the room even though there was no place for anyone to conceal themselves. Sakura furrowed her eyebrows; he'd been here a mere second ago and she hadn't seen him leave the room. There was only one door to the room.

"Sasuke?" she called out. She wondered if he'd used his fast teleporter-like speed to leave the room that she hadn't seen. Finally she walked out feeling anxious and left for the other rooms.

Empty. Empty...empty...

"Sasuke…Where are you?" she said apprehensively moving her head from left to right feeling agitated. All of a sudden, a door appeared. One that had never existed previously. One that she'd never been through. She decided not to go inside but backed out. Sakura fast walked around the house looking around for the rest of the ninja group.

Nobody was there.

She was alone in the house, trapped in a genjutsu so powerful that she couldn't release it.

A spark of relief prickled inside her when she saw a flicker of an Akatsuki coat and cautiously followed it. She called out his name again until she decided to turn back...but as she did she turned around and bumped into Sasuke.

"Sakura, what are you doing?" he asked simply.

"Oh my-Sasuke what happened? Where were you? Where is everyone else?" she breathed as her jolted heart began pounding her chest.

"I was here, just like always...as is everyone else."

"But every room was empty and everyone disappeared so I thought I was in a genjutsu."

Sasuke just stared at her. His curse mark appeared far worse than it ever had with its sickening scratches around it.

"Sasuke what's wrong?" she asked clutching her backpack to her chest feeling guarded.

He walked up to her and kissed her. If she were in her right mind it would've been the best thing to have ever happened to her but something was off; she knew that Sasuke would never kiss her. She pulled away from him and felt something slippery sliding down from her nose to her upper lip.

Blood.

Her eyes grew wide as her breathing quickened when she saw it. She let out a scream.

"Let's play a game" Sasuke said blankly. "_Hide and seek, hide and seek, hide and seek, hide and seek..." _A little girl's voice was then heard laughing coming from Sasuke's mouth.

Sakura backed out of the room and began running until she bumped into another Sasuke. And another one and another one.

She screamed and smacked her tough hands together to break the genjutsu as unnerved as she was when she continued screaming. Until she opened her eyes and heard someone yelling her name.

"Sakura, Sakura, SAKURA! Sakura calm down, what's wrong?"

Sakura opened her wide terrified eyes and found that Naruto was holding onto her. All of the Sasuke's she'd just seen turned into her Leaf teammates and Taka who were huddled around her. She breathed hard and tried to calm down.

"Sakura what happened? You have all of us worried, and your nose is bleeding." said Naruto.

"Genjutsu, the rogue." she gasped wiping her nose of blood.

"What did you see?" asked Ino hoping that it could be a clue to where Shikamaru and Tenten could be.

"Sasuke…_Sasuke_! Where's Sasuke?" she cried.

All the remaining ninja in the living room scanned the room and stood in silence trying to think or hear anything that might indicate where Sasuke was.

"He's not in this house!" Kariin shrieked feeling his chakra in a distant area. Naruto's whiskers thickened into a threatening black as his fingernails threatened to grow into talons. Sakura began to panic; she had no idea how to reverse Naruto's transformation by herself if his ninetails cloak appeared.

"Sasuke's missing?" Where is he?" Jugo roared at the Leaf ninja; he stomped closer to them as black markings slid onto his face changing his skin and eye appearance. He was about to swing his giant fist at the watery ground when a familiar prickling throbbed inside Kariin; she didn't have to guess who it was, she knew it all too well.

"Wait!" Kariin yelled "I can feel him, he's—

A frustrated yell echoed outside from the thawing forest.

The ninja group rushed for the front door with Naruto and Jugo leading in front. They slammed the door open and waited in anticipation as someone appeared.

Sasuke Uchiha emerged out of the shadows of the darkening forest. Kariin's eyes shone at the sight of him, as did Naruto's until their smiles and delights froze on their faces.

Sasuke stumbled out. Black Akatsuki cloak blotched in stains of his own blood. His white shirt dyed red by his own blood. His katana skewered through his abdomen.

Sakura's heart stopped. Naruto froze. Kariin covered her mouth.

Sasuke fell flat onto his face, the katana slipping out slightly as his body hit the ground.

Kariin was the first to scream as they scrambled out the door and ran to him. Everything was a blur; Sakura could feel her tears streaming down her face and her ears drowning out any noise as they picked him up and carried him back into the house.

Back in the living room, Sakura dislodged the katana and began healing him. Naruto lifted his sword and saw the words '_No knife allowed_' scratched on it. Sakura touched his bloodied chest...thank the heavens. It had missed his vital organs. A smile appeared on her face. Sasuke came back into consciousness as she wiped his face of any sweat.

"Sasuke." she whispered not caring about anything else. He sat up quickly and in alarm.

"Sasuke, don't' move so fast. I just healed you-"

"-It was the rogue," he stated looking up at all of them close to his face, "The reason why we haven't been able to finish this is because we were targeting the wrong person. The rogue ninja is not Hayashi Fukazawa; Fukazawa is dead as we all know."

"What do you mean?" asked Kariin looking him in the eyes.

"The rogue ninja is actually the little girl. She's the one behind all this. Her genjutsu power is omnipotent and deserves to be revered. I've never seen anything like it, and she's just a little girl..." he gasped in astonishment.

The world began to spin dizzyingly too fast as they were all left reeling at the information. Sakura could feel a carpet being pulled from under her. She tried to speak but was rendered speechless.

"_Himiko_" she whispered softly in her head unbelieving.

"She's able to possess both dead and living bodies without having to reanimate them using the reanimation jutsu. I saw Neji's body there discarded in the forest but still alive...That's probably why Orochimaru came after her, to use that skill, perhaps kekkei genkai, of hers to take over people's bodies without having to wait three years or going through a painful and rigorous method whenever he needed a new body to prolong his life."

Sakura remembered the poem in the personal book 'White Lotus' that Namiko had written. It made sense to her now.

"Her family owned a funeral business so she must've learned of her abilities to possess dead and living bodies' there." she said taking the book from the shelf, grateful it was not among the severely burned ones.

Changes in the wind

_My gentle child_

_With a gentle soul _

_Blowing in the gentle breeze_

_What powers are these?_

_The **imitation** of bodies _

_The light in your eyes _

_I see through your disguise_

_A fear of the scourge_

_Hide until its safe to emerge _

_You are buried deep _

_For now go to sleep_

"This must be it; her mother Namiko probably wrote this poem when she found out about her daughter's ability and when they both came to live here. 'The imitation of bodies, I see through your disguise' that's when she was probably possessing bodies and pretending to be the person. A fear of the scourge is Orochimaru, but this part 'you are buried deep, for now go to sleep..."

"It's talking about the bodies in the forest", he said needing to elaborate seeing their widening eyes, "The whole forest is under control of a massive force of genjutsu like a spider's web. There are dead bodies lying scattered underground and hidden by the genjutsu."

"Sasuke, you don't think that the little girl is also dead do you? Like she's a ghost?" asked Naruto gulping his fears down. Sasuke merely shrugged his shoulders.

"How is it that Kariin was unable to feel the chakra at times?" asked Suigetsu.

"She hides her chakra when she's inside you. That's why she was able to get inside Naruto even with the ninetails. She locks away her chakra and goes undetected."

Naruto remembered what his fox spirit had said when it was so agitated. "_How can I reject that chakra if I can't find it?"_It had roared. "That's right. The ninetailed fox definitely felt her inside me but couldn't keep her out because he couldn't find her, then she screamed as she ran past me and the fox"

"But I found a weakness. She's unable to hide her chakra while travelling from body to 's why Kariin is able to feel her chakra for a few seconds as she changes bodies then dissapears as she enters another one. " said Sasuke.

"That's also why Ino was the only one who'd acknowledged that there was something in her head. She has the Yamanaka clan telepathy so she must've felt the chakra inside her head. I wonder if it works similarly." said Sakura looking at a disturbed Ino.

A lightbulb went on in Sakura's head as she remembered what had been written on the wall. 'Hide and seek, hide and seek, all I want is your body'.

"Hide and Seek, this is all just a game to her, she's just a little girl so she calls it hide and seek like the kids game. I mean, what do parents do to try and help little children understand difficult situations? They frame it within a context that they can understand. I'm betting that her mother Namiko told her that they were just playing a game of 'hide and seek' as they hid from Orochimaru who was seeking them out as a way for her to understand and not be afraid and to have a hiding place if he ever did show up. It makes sense, look at this house with all its hidden rooms, locations. "

Sakura stood up and covered her eyes while everyone else watched her.

"One, two, three four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven...ready or not, here we come Himiko." she yelled.

A few seconds later, sinister writing appeared on the wall...

_You better start hiding..._

_I will be the one to seek you out..._

_You don't want me to find you..._

Kariin held onto Sasuke in fright as a shaky rambling sound was heard coming from the bathroom. The ninja waited in anticipation for whatever was to come...

The burst pipe that had been leaking under the genjutsu rattled until...

It exploded; releasing a monstrous tsunami wall of water that seemed too improbable to fit in the house. The ninja's screamed, held onto each other and braced themselves for the unescapable giant wave that felt like a solid concrete wall when it thrashed into them, then washed them all away...

Ino and Jugo were the first ones to disappear...

**6:18 pm**

Kariin lifted her head above the water gasping for breath as she stood up on both her legs. The water was skin numbingly icy but luckily it only reached her chest. She whipped around looking for everyone else but it appeared that she was the only one there.

The house had now become a maze of walls and unending corridors, doors and rooms. Perfect for hide and seek.

She stopped walking and held her failing breath for a second when she saw a bubble float to the surface of the water.

Suigetsu poked only his head out the water taking advantage of being in his natural habitat.

"Suigetsu, don't scare me like that!" she snapped.

"So do you need my help manoeuvring through this genjutsu water or not?" he teased after her sudden snap at him.

"Wait, I can see someone's shadow, coming over there" she pointed frantically towards the right angle corner of the wall to their right. Suigetsu could feel her shaking and not from the icy water as she absent-mindedly clutched onto his skinny shoulders.

Someone with dark brown hair and farmers robes was gliding silently down the maze of halls through the water, seeking them out. Suigetsu covered Kariin's mouth knowing that she wanted to scream. He remembered the writing on the wall '_You don't want me to find you...'_

Kariin and Suigetsu embodied frozen statues and kept their inhaled breaths as they prayed that they wouldn't be discovered. Suigetsu could hear Kariin's overworked heartbeat in the silence.

Hayashi moved, sliding eerily in the water… closer… closer…closer…Kariin let out a soft moan in dread as Suigetsu tightened his grip on her mouth…

The rogue ninja as Hayashi Fukazawa stopped…then decided not to continue walking their way and instead changed direction.

Kariin heaved out a long held sigh in relief as she stood shaking while Suigetsu closed his eyes and shook his head. The nightmare was over. He was gone. Now they had to somehow find everyone else without bumping into the rogue.

Kariin looked down as another bubble floated to the surface.

"Suigetsu stop_ doing_ that" she whispered sharply. He shook his head at her.

"That...that wasn't me!" he said unnerved.

They both looked at each other in a knowing way...

Kariin felt a hand grab her leg from under the water while Suigetsu felt another hand. There was no time to scream as they were both pulled under forcefully into the depths of the darkest genjutsu.

**6:20 pm**

Sakura Haruno moved slowly in the still water clutching her side once it was apparent that it was impossible to walk on the surface of the water. She stopped to heal the cut from when they were all swept away by the water and her right side caught the sharp end of the fireplace poker as frozen as her hands were. She didn't have enough chakra to break the overpowering genjutsu she was trapped inside.

Someone turned the corner as her heart jolted into her throat. Blue-black hair, charming cute face...Sasuke Uchiha. She froze not knowing whether he was the real one or not. She took out a kunai from her pouch.

"No Sakura wait, it's me" he said walking in the water towards her.

"Stay away from me." she breathed trying to run away in the icy water. Her mind kept reminding her how the rogue killed people by seppuku...by disembowelment as she'd already been cut by the poker on her diaphragm, or...water...Sakura let out a tiny scream as Sasuke gained on her...

Thankfully Naruto Uzumaki was swept into the hallyway that she and Sasuke were in. He saw his teammate just in time and sprung into action by jumping up and punching Sasuke in his face thinking that Sasuke had revealed himself as a pretender. Sasuke fell backwards into the water as Naruto stood next to Sakura waiting. Sakura breathed in relief at the rescue by her teammate as Sasuke lifted his head out of the water.

"Wait you idiot, it's me Sasuke." he said massaging his cheek. When Naruto and Sakura exchanged glances he knew what they were thinking. He took Sakura's head in his hands and pulled her closer to look into his dark eyes; making her blush slightly.

She saw his sharingan turn on. He couldn't be the rogue. They both relaxed their stances.

"Where's everyone else?" asked Naruto.

"I don't know but we need to get out of here if we ever want to find them. Naruto you're the only one who has chakra stronger than all of us but I think we can overpower this genjutsu if we combine our chakra," said Sasuke.

Sakura felt the most pleasant jerking of her insides when Sasuke took her right hand and held it tightly, then did the same thing to Naruto. Understanding what he was doing, she took Naruto's other hand as she and Naruto stared at each other with overjoyed smiles.

"Together," Sasuke said determinedly looking at them both, "Together", choked Naruto and Sakura looking back at him, overwhelmed by the emotion of the moment.

**6:37 pm**

"RELEASE!"

The entire room swam in front of them as all three overpowered the immediate genjustu and the flood waters vanished completely. The house was finally back to its dry charred state without a drop of water found anywhere except for the three former team seven shinobi.

Sakura scanned the room as they let go of each other's hands; it appeared that they were the only ones left. Then her eyes noticed something.

It was pasted on the back of the bookshelf.

"Here it is. The last piece of the article, but it only has the credits and references of the articles' writers and contributors." she said peeling it off the back of the shelf.

Sasuke took it from her and turned it around. Something was written on the back of the article in orange crayon once again.

_Hide and Seek_

_Hide and Seek_

_All I want is your body_

_In the ground_

_Or just outside_

_I just want a place to hide_

"I guess that confirms it then. 'In the ground' meaning dead bodies and 'or just outside' meaning ordinary and living people around." said Sasuke.

"Sasuke we have to finish this and now. Remember what happened when you did her made up jutsu before? She came here as Hayashi. Maybe it could work the same way" said Sakura.

He nodded his head looking at both Naruto and Sakura as he tried the quick handsigns again.

"Ninja art: hide and seek"

**5:49 pm**

Nothing came at first.

Then...the familiar earthquake grumbling of the ground...

Naruto saw it first.

A bright light beaming from a distance outside the window. As it came closer he saw what it was: the giant oni beast pulling a wagon on fire being dragged by its flaming tail headed towards the house. He gasped. Time began to move in slow motion.

"GET DOWN!" he screamed as Sakura and Sasuke saw it; Naruto crawled closer to Sakura as did Sasuke instinctively as they all covered their heads and placed their bodies firmly flat on the ground.

A giant roar sounded just before the galloping demon beast dog leaped forward with perfect trajectory as it ploughed through the house with all its fire. Sakura gave a slowed down scream as wood and fiery debris came raining on them.

The instant the oni had broken through and reached the other side of the house, it disappeared.

The old team seven looked up; the entire house was engulfed in a ring of fire entrapping them where they were. The house had already been burned previously now there was nothing left to burn yet the fire kept on dancing around them.

It had been reduced to a wall-less, roofless house with only three remaining support beams standing. Sasuke looked up in time to see someone throwing a flaming piece of wood towards them. He drew out his katana and sliced it and blocked it as Naruto and Sakura turned around.

The silhouette of someone holding a lantern was seen walking through the now non-existent door. Hayashi Fukazawa walked out and stared them down.

"It's time to play my favourite game hide and seek. You've been here for four and a half hours now and I'm done waiting."

Sakura felt her stomach dropping as she looked at Naruto and Sasuke; they'd all forgotten that in a genjutsu, time was an illusion as well. This meant that the entire time that they'd arrived at the isolated house; everything had been a genjutsu right from the start. Sakura couldn't believe that the two days they had spent at the house had actually only been four and a half hours in reality.

"Now, I'm going to give you a chance to run and hide just like all the betrayers of mine in Grass Village. _You don't want me to find you_." he grumbled lowly turning to Sasuke. "All the bodies you saw in Minamoto No forest are the losers of this game who were found."

"What are you talking about?" asked Naruto.

"One by one, I trapped people of the Grass Village in my genjutsu then told them to run and hide away from me, giving them a fair chance to escape. If I find them...I go inside their bodies and make them kill themselves by water, by knives making it look like seppuku. This is my Hide and Seek."

"She's sick!" yelled Naruto.

"But why," whined Sakura, "You're not supposed to be a monster".

"This is my way of seeking justice and revenge. The betrayers should also know what it's like to run away and hide in fear while someone haunting tries to seek you out. They deserve to know the same pain as my mother and I felt. The people of the Grass did this to us."

"Then when will it stop?" demanded Sasuke annoyed at the childish lack of discipline. "You've already had your revenge on the people of this village. Or are you going to stop once there's not even a single person left? Revenge is a dark, consuming and poisonous process that demands proper planning, not childish games. Otherwise you'll just end up as empty as you are now." Sakura and Naruto looked at each other pained; those words of his had haunted them for so long.

"You wouldn't understand it." he cried never knowing that he was talking to the wrong person.

He closed his eyes. "Now I'm going to start counting so you'd better start hiding. One. Two. Three..."

Sakura looked at Naruto and Sasuke who didn't dare move. They couldn't be afraid anymore. No more running or hiding.

"...Eight. Nine. Ten. Eleven. Ready or not, here I come" he said removing his hands from his face. He looked at them blankly when they were still standing and staring at him in defiance.

"We're not here to play your sadistic childish games" roared Sasuke angrily as he launched forward. He threw his katana sizzling with the lightning of chidori but Hayashi tilted his head to one side and it missed him, but not the charge. The blue lightning charge struck his eye and it fell out to their horror.

Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura jumped forward as Sakura balled up her fists ready to strike.

"Shadow clone jutsu," yelled Naruto extending his palm of his hand out as his clone spun an orb of blue into his hands. "Rasengan!"

Hayashi saw Naruto coming towards him with the jutsu that he wasn't able to do when he's possessed Naruto's body. He quickly twisted and tangled his fingers together in a quick formation before Naruto had the chance to strike him.

"Ninja art: hide and seek" he roared.

It happened too quickly for them to react. Hayashi's bright orange chakra was visible as he closed his eyes and his chakra traveled in the air.

Sasuke saw it heading his way; his sharingan and speed were the only power that could keep up with the speed with which the chakra could travel. If Kariin were there it was only then that she would feel it. He readied his chidori to strike it in mid-air. If his theory was correct then the chakra would be useless as it missed him, the same way as Ino's mind possession jutsu.

He saw it coming...

Then suddenly: it disappeared. Sasuke gasped in shock as he realised and swore under his breath.

Sakura and Naruto watched Hayashi and Sasuke's bodies drop to the floor and contort in the most sickening way. His squirmed and writhed and limbs twisted in the incorrect bone braking angles. Sakura screamed at the horror as they watched their eyes roll back into their heads. It was quiet for a second then:

Sasuke stood up and smiled at them.

"Ooh, this boy's _cute_! Such_ gorgeous_ eyes and body. But I don't get it. Why won't you play hide and seek with me?" said Sasuke in a whiny tone as his sharingan disappeared; the rogue ninja was aware of the power of who it possessed but couldn't use it.

"No we won't let you get away with Sasuke's body!" yelled Naruto.

"Why? Are you afraid that I'll use his intestines as a skipping rope?" he said darkly.

Sakura's stomach tightened at the sickening words that a once innocent girl could even think of. For Naruto, the shock of hearing the horrific gory words talking about his friend made him freeze for a second, which is all the rogue ninja needed to launch forward aiming for Naruto and seized a fistful of his yellow hair, pulling him with great speed towards his body.

Sakura turned to see the rogue ninja as Sasuke with one arm around Naruto's neck and the other pointing a kunai at Naruto's temple. He was in a tight headlock.

"No, Sasuke stop." yelled Sakura. She waited anxiously staring at Sasuke afraid of what he might do.

"Stop fighting or I'll force this knife through your friend's head." said Sasuke blankly.

Sakura felt her blood boil and ran towards the rogue ninja in Sasuke's body; she couldn't tolerate anyone impersonating Sasuke...She growled as she swung her fist at him but her surprised eyes grew wide when Naruto yelled at her from the deadlock grip around his throat.

"Stop Sakura! You're going to hurt Sasuke!" he cried with shiny blue eyes in Sasuke's arms. Sakura could see that even though it was really the rogue ninja, Naruto still had his protective personality over his best friend and wouldn't allow anyone, not even Sakura to hurt him.

"I thought you said that no knives were allowed?" cried Sakura panicking and hoping that the rogue would stick to her own rules.

"I know. But this friend of yours I'm inside has brought a katana so it's only fair now. I have only one request. I will give you all your friends back and allow you to leave if you allow me to have this one body for myself." he said pulling Naruto's hair firmer.

Sakura exclaimed out loud and groped in the air at Naruto. "What are you going to do with him?" demanded Sakura staring at the fake Sasuke.

"Experiment on him further. I've never hidden inside the host of a tailed beast. I had no idea I could do it. So, I want to find out whether I can still go inside the body if I kill him and leave the monster still inside for more power. For future purposes." he said simply.

Sakura gasped; she was under the impression that the little girl would never resort to the kind of methods that 'the snake' her and her mother feared so much had evilly employed.

"Experiment? You're just as much of a scourge as Orochimaru was. Is that what your mother wanted for you?" she demanded.

Sasuke's eyes began to bulge slightly out of their sockets as his body trembled at what she'd said. Naruto shot her a 'stop it' look but Sakura knew her question about Namiko was important in stirring up emotions in her hidden daughter.

"Orochimaru," he whispered shakily trying not to lose control, "You think you know her, Namiko Kamakura just because of a few books and pictures? You don't know anything about _my momma_. She was a gracious, kind-hearted woman who didn't deserve the unfair punishment and death given to her by the devilish people of this world." he whispered shaking.

"It's not about what people deserve or not because you've become the same kind of monster that you and your mother feared for so long."

"I've never killed anyone who is not of the Grass Village" he spat. Sakura heaved a slight sigh internally; it meant that all their Leaf Village comrades and the Taka were okay. "But this will be my first time" he yelled throwing Naruto at her and using the opportunity to run away.

Naruto and Sakura gave chase to the fake Sasuke jumping over the wicked flames blackening the house further. Sasuke was headed towards the patio but a wall of fire barred him. He stopped at the entrapping fire and fell to the ground instantly.

Sakura and Naruto gasped in fear as they saw his body drop suddenly and dangerously too close to the fire. "_Please be okay Sasuke. Naruto will never forgive me if anything..." _she said in her head.

As they got to Sasuke, they dropped to their knees to help him up, his pretty onyx eyes flickered open to see Naruto staring anxiously too close to his face. He doubled back slightly and saw the fire surrounding them.

"Sasuke, are you okay?" whined Sakura covering her mouth trying to keep recover from the shock.

"Yes but what happened after she possessed me?"

"She told us that you were cute and she likes your body. Then after she wanted to kill me, she ran away and we saw you fall on the floor." said Naruto smiling slightly with his eyes shining with tears as he saw his friend in normal condition. A smile broke across Sakura's face at Naruto's comment and silliness, she did agree with the cuteness statement after all. Sasuke shook his head and tried with great effort not to smile as well; it turned into a broody pout.

"Little freak of nature. Her chakra already begins to hide in the air before it comes into you. That's why I couldn't stop It." he cursed standing up.

A loud clap reverberated through the destroyed house through the forest as they were enveloped in total darkness.

**7:04 pm**

Sakura stirred and opened her eyes in the instant that the darkness had been lifted. The pink haired kunoichi was sitting at the base of a support beam. She looked down and noticed that she was tied to the column by a thick choking rope tied like a noose.

The genjutsu of the rogue ninja was an incredibly formidable power in her arsenal she knew as Sasuke had said. She looked over to her left and saw Naruto and Sasuke were tied next to each other on the same beam. She was the only one separated.

"Where did the rogue ninja go?" whispered Sakura anxiously turning her head from side to side while struggling against the tight rope binding her to the beam.

Naruto struggled against the binding rope to try and free his arm to release the genjutsu but the rope was body breaking tight.

"I can't get loose to break the jutsu." Naruto complained. Sakura only wondered why she was tied up alone and separate from Sasuke and Naruto. "Let me try reaching my katana" came Sasuke.

The familiar creaking of the wooden floorboards came as all three stopped. The situation was precarious. They were bound to columns by tight rope while a vicious body snatcher was coming...

Creak, creak, creak.

Hayashi Fukazawa arrived in sight of them all and stared at Sakura only with his one remaining eye. There was a straight fireless path leading right to where she was tied. He stopped walking and dropped to the floor as the orange chakra traveled to an unknown location. The three ninja gasped at the spectacle...

Then someone was walking towards them through the fire.

Sakura's heart skipped a beat as she finally saw her for the first time.

A little girl.

Appearing to be around ten years old, she had ghostly white skin, long dark hair, a single trailed nosebleed and a white dress with was unrecognisable with its dirt and stains. Sakura could see her curse mark on her left shoulder with all the self-mutilation looking scratches around them. Then there was her face, it's beauty and innocence hidden by the evil and ferocious, twisted and contorted expression of enraged bitterness, just as it was in her picture that made Sakura recoil.

She was carrying her Barbie doll in one hand and Suigetsu's blade in the other hand walking closer and closer to her in great speed. Sakura stared at her in awe: she couldn't believe just how everything they'd been through on the mission beginning with the blast had all been orchestrated by this one lone little girl.

"Run Sakura, RUN!" shouted Naruto terrified for his teammate.

Sakura struggled against the ropes binding her as she heard Naruto's fearful scream for her to get away. She began to panic as Himiko came closer. She knew that she would have to stop the possession of her body at all cost or the little girl would take over her body and control her movements to stab herself with Suigetsu's blade.

Himiko did her impossibly fast jutsu just as Sakura freed her arm and punched her on her cheek without enough momentum so Himiko's head merely slumped backwards as the little girl's chakra became a visible shining orange. Then Sakura held Himiko's small head tightly in her one hand.

Sakura hand began burning furiously as she felt the pure, raw, powerful chakra burn intensely up her arm.

Sakura and Himiko both screamed as their eyes rolled to the back of their heads when the body possession jutsu backfired as it had been interrupted before Himiko could release her chakra fully.

Sakura and Himiko lost consciousness.

Everything went white...


	7. Chapter 7: hide and seek

**Chapter 7: hide and seek: Himiko's story**

**A/N: This final chapter is dedicated to the most inspirational story/fandom, the masterpiece we call 'Naruto' as the manga officially ends this week/month (people please don't give out spoilers, have some decency!). It's been a privilege._.._**

_A fine autumn breeze snaked its curves across the greenest waist high grasses and exhaled out to cool off the inside of a stuffy old church packed with lugubrious mourners in downtown Kusagakure: The Grass Village. A blinding light appeared in the empty space next to the mourners. The light painted in the essence of a pink haired teenage girl who manifested among them._

_Sakura saw her body appearing bit by bit into an unknown church and took in her surroundings in amazement. _

_Below the holy altar lay open a black wooden casket of a dead body dressed in a Sunday best suit. Alongside the corpse flourished a thousand blossoms for his departed soul. Sakura examined the congregants of mourning, grieving and black-clad people paying their last respects...until she looked down to see someone sitting on the wide lap of a stern, mean spirited looking middle aged woman in the front row pews... _

_Himiko._

_Sakura surveyed the surroundings cautiously and looked at herself again when a thought occurred to her; it was Himiko, this was her memory that she'd been thrust into because of the backfired body possession jutsu when it had been interrupted. _

_The five year old dark haired little girl was tugging at the uncomfortably tight neck collar of her beautiful grey funeral dress tied with a green bow as a necktie and long hanging sashes, until she was given a quick smack on her wrist to stop fidgeting by the scowling woman whose lap she was sitting on. She appeared as innocent as the photo in which Sakura had seen her taken from the seventh bedroom. _

_Sakura looked back to the altar as an old man with a white beard pointing low to his chest came to stand before the congregation. Himiko's strict and puritanical yet highly respected grandfather and leader of the Kamakura clan known for his conservative values, Lord Izanagi no Kamakura-sama, stepped forward. He was flanked by Himiko's uncles Fujiwara Kamakura, the kind-hearted funeral director, and the ever stoic Yamaga and Noburu Kamakura standing with their heads bowed respectfully. _

_Sakura did a double take after she'd acknowledged the men in her head, having no idea how she knew who the people were. Her mouth hung open when a thought occurred to her; the genjutsu controlling the minds of other people was surely being used to look into their minds and memories as genjutsu was a manipulator of the mind anyway, she knew that it had to be the way in which Himiko knew not only the names of people but their personalities, in order for her to help her 'pretend' to be them when she possessed their bodies. Sakura looked down at the little girl again in awe; it was astonishing to her how Himiko was able to wield and control such a magnificent power at such a young age. _

_Himiko's pouting at her aunt Miyako's reprimand vanished as Lord Izanagi retreated from the altar after speaking to everyone, to make way for a beautiful young woman in a tightly bound long black kimono gliding towards the podium. As Himiko watched proudly, Sakura etched ever closer for the first time, entranced at the elegant young mother and funeral poet stopping before the crowd to offer words of peace, healing and hope to grieving family. Sakura lit up, grateful at finally having the chance to watch Namiko Kamakura read her self-written poetry in person. She was as graceful as she'd imagined. _

_After the inspiring message of hope and healing Sakura turned to observe how Himiko watched the grieving family; she appeared confused and heartbroken at the sight of people in pain yet again having gone to many funerals before. Himiko turned back to stare mesmerised at the coffin as if bidden to do so; Sakura narrowed her eyes at her suspiciously waiting to see what Himiko was about to do. She appeared hypnotised by the body in a way that made Sakura feel uncomfortable as Himiko stared unblinking at it until she closed her eyes..._

_With a feeling of inevitability, Sakura walked up to the open coffin lying at the altar. Her heart gave a startled jolt and mouth flew open when the dead man's eyes opened steadily. He opened his eyes to stare at the ceiling just as Sakura hovered her invisible face above the coffin, praying that the naïve little girl wouldn't do what she probably thought was a way to make the grieving family happy again. But it was exactly her intention; Himiko as the dead man lying in the coffin sat up slowly. Sakura cringed and covered her mouth waiting for the damage to happen... _

_A grieving woman who'd had her head buried in the chest of another family member sitting nearest to the altar was the first to notice; she blinked away tears as her eyes grew wide in horror. She emitted a piercing scream that alarmed the whole congregation as she pointed at the dead man waking up to look at them smiling happily. _

_Chaos erupted from the church as people grabbed their belongings and fled as they screamed; Sakura saw the confused look on Himiko as the dead man's face; she honestly and innocently thought that animating his body would bring joy to the family as they would reunite with their dead loved one. _

_It was a panicked stupor; Sakura saw Namiko looking around for her daughter only for Himiko's aunt to scream so loud that it stopped everyone in their tracks to look at her. Himiko's body was shaking uncontrollably, limbs twisting and contorting with her eyes rolling to the back of her head as if she was in an incantation. Everyone's heads shifted from the dead man woken up, to Himiko's body and back...they put two and two together and realised that the old dead man was actually Himiko somehow. _

_The dead man's body dropped to the floor and began to also shake uncontrollably as his soulless eyes rolled to the back of his head. Himiko's body stopped shaking instantaneously. Himiko returned to her own body as her mother picked her up. _

_A thousand pairs of conservative religious eyes were locked on the mother and daughter. Himiko's aunt shook her head slowly in horror and yelled out to the crowd "witches!" with a long pointed finger... _

_A swirl of motion in the air and Sakura was taken to a different setting in a quiet neighbourhood. Sakura was taken to a home, presumably belonging to Namiko and her vilified daughter, and sure enough the two hurriedly walked into their home where Namiko stooped down onto her knees in the house corridor and looked Himiko straight in her eyes to inquire about her daughter's power. Sakura saw that Namiko's eyes were far more of a concerned nature rather than the accusatory fear like the people of the church. _

_Himiko told her mother that she'd always been able to feel the spiritual energy of other people including her own somehow, but she didn't know how or why. She explained that she once found a way to 'move into' the bodies of other people once when she woke up in someone else's body but couldn't understand what had happened to her so she'd kept quiet. She also added that that she'd just wanted to help the grieving, pained family. Sakura knew immediately that she had inherited a special kekkei genkai that her family was probably unaware of. It was the only explanation of her power. _

_xxx_

_Soon the entire village was buzzing about the 'devilish' act witnessed in the church by a member of the highly respected puritan noble Kamakura family who were long responsible for burying the dead of the Grass and how the virtuous clan had been shamed beyond comprehension; no one would ever want a family associated with witchcraft to look after their dead and trust another Kamakura for as long as they lived. False claims heightened and exaggerated fear quickly made sure that all kinds of rumours spread to the people and well past the borders of the Grass Village of a young girl who was an 'evil witch' they spoke, who 'brought the dead back to life' by her 'mother's command' as she read from her 'grimoire book' they gossiped, until the day when gossip brought about its real damage. _

_Sakura was taken to a quiet day in Grass Village where people were going about their day, including Namiko holding her daughters' hand as they prepared to leave the house, covering her and Himiko's face with a hooded cloak to avoid any unwanted prejudice from the superstitious people, and the two headed out into the day market. _

_As Namiko and Himiko strolled through the marketplace, a rambling sound shook the green blanketed ground. Even though Sakura couldn't exactly feel it, it still made her look uneasily at the mother and daughter. She remembered Himiko's drawings of a monster coming to destroy their home..._

_Everyone in the Grass Village stopped what they were doing and stood watching, waiting for the source of the disruption to appear. Slowly one by one they all turned their heads towards the main gate of the village with Sakura following suit. _

_Boom_

_A giant snake with three heads broke through the main gate and slithered into the village, destroying many of the buildings and houses lining the streets and anything in its long tails' path. People scattered and ran for their lives, until one single purple snake emerged behind the three headed python, and on it...a cruel snake; the embodiment of a man known for his disregard for human life. _

_Sakura clenched her fists involuntarily as Orochimaru riding on his snake Manda broke through the fleeing crowd of people and instructed his snake summoning to block the people's paths with its thick body, forcing them to stop running. Orochimaru looked hungrily at the crowd as he licked his lips with his abnormally long sickening tongue..._

_Then he did what Sakura feared from the start...he asked for her...Orochimaru demanded the people of the Grass to hand over the girl he'd heard had the power to possess bodies. Everyone's eyes turned to a young mother holding her daughter close to her as they recognised her face from under a hood. Namiko tried to make a run for it with Himiko but was hampered by people in the way..._

_Orochimaru instructed his snakes to go after them both; Sakura felt her heart clenching painfully as she saw Namiko be the only one to run to protect her little girl. Luckily it didn't last long; more than two dozen shinobi dressed in black and animal masks wearing headbands of the Grass Village and as Sakura noted appreciatively, of the Leaf Village swooped in on the area forcing Orochimaru to retreat. Namiko was finally able to stop running. Himiko's confused face looked up at her relieved mother. _

_But Orochimaru wouldn't allow himself to be bested; he stretched his snake like neck across the courtyard as the ANBU gained on him; it happened too quickly for anyone to realise what was happening. Orochimaru sank his teeth into Himiko's shoulder then pulled his neck back into its original length and began retreating as the black ops chased him. He promised the people of the Grass that he would return for her again one day..._

_Namiko pulled her daughter closer to her in a panic; Himiko began screaming in a tortured piercing assaulting scream clutching and ripping her tiny fingernails through the flesh of her shoulder as it burned as people crowded them and blocked their ears. Sakura knew the scream all too well as she'd heard it a number of times. It took her back to when Sasuke had been bitten by Orochimaru in the Forest of Death during team seven's first Chunin exams; Sasuke had also been in excruciating pain afterwards. Namiko picked Himiko up as her shoulder began bleeding from her unrelenting scratching at the intense burning as she hurried back to their home. _

_By the time they got back to their mostly destroyed home Namiko noticed that her daughter's condition had worsened; Himiko had frightful looking black markings appearing on the left side of her body. But the horror was far from over, Namiko saw that her little girl's left eye was turning into a red demonic colour as she placed her in the broken bathtub. She wept for the tainted innocence of her daughter that the demon snake had marred with its curse placed on her neck. Sakura closed her eyes in sadness at their fate. _

_xxx_

_The scene changed and Sakura opened her eyes again to see that the daimyo of the Grass had sent a letter to Namiko Kamakura stating that she'd been summoned for a public discussion and intervention about what had happened. Clearly the talk of the village could no longer be ignored. _

_Namiko made her way to the Grass Village public square with Sakura following behind her uneasily. As they walked through Himiko's memory she saw how most of the village had been reduced to rubble under the load of the giant snakes from Orochimaru. The Grass Village had never been as developed and prosperous as the Leaf Village so their infrastructure had taken a huge hit. _

_Piercing, biting, judgemental and narrowed eyes followed Namiko and her cowering daughter at her side covered in another hooded cloak, as they stood on a raised platform with the daimyo of the Grass and Lord Izanagi, elder of the Kamakura clan and Namiko's father. Lord Kamakura-sama shook his head at her in disdain. Namiko looked away unknowing of what to do._

_Then the fireworks from the people came; they lambasted her to give the 'demonic' child up; they blamed her for the old noble Kamakura clan's irrevocable disrepute. They pointed and yelled out obscenities at her as their anger of their destroyed village spilled out and begged for her expulsion and excommunication from the church and village. They saw her as a threat to their future security as the 'demon snake in the Grass' vowed to come back for them both. Himiko saw the way in which her mother was being treated; as much as she didn't understand local politics, she did at least understand the hostilities in their tones of voice and began crying. Sakura remembered Himiko's drawing of her blue crayon tears... _

_The defiant and courageous Namiko stood poised before the crowd and refused to give her child up. Namiko could see it in her father's and all the Kamakuras' eyes; their anger was exacerbated by her being an unmarried woman protecting her love child with a man long gone. They didn't see Himiko as a real Kamakura as she'd been fathered by an outsider which was unheard of for the religious, conservative, puritan clan. The daimyo spoke with Lord Izanagi softly in his ear then addressed the crowd and Namiko. _

_He agreed to sentence Namiko and her illegitimate daughter into hiding on the outskirts of the Grass, where one of the the oldest Kamakura residences lay, to keep the people of the Grass safe from another attack from the 'demon snake'. The people cheered as the verdict was given out. Namiko looked at her disapproving scowling father one last time as he made another announcement: that the family was disbanding as it was the most honourable thing to do in the face of the scandal and shame. But he would remain the Grass until his death but his three sons Fujuwara, Yamada and Noburu and his daughter Miyako would vacate to other lands while Namiko went into hiding. _

_Namiko put on a brave face as she packed her and Himiko's belongings amongst the destroyed area and people rebuilding. Sakura only wished she could only help them somehow but it was a memory... _

_It was afternoon before Namiko and Himiko were about to leave, she stopped by the main gate when a warm hand gently touched her shoulder as she turned around. Her kindhearted brother Fujiwara Kamakura promising to send a builder to the old Kamakura house in Minamoto No Forest they were heading to, to help them reconstruct the house for them to properly hide in before he left for another land; after all he couldn't leave his younger sister to fend for herself. _

_She thanked him for his neverending generosity and allowed for one final tearful sibling embrace before she turned around and saw men chipping away at a sign painted 'Kamakura Funeral Services' on a surviving nearby old building. With a pained heart she headed out into the day with nothing more than a few backpacks and only child and an invisible Sakura. _

_xxx_

_The memory changed again and Sakura saw it before it came; her stomach tightened at seeing it again... the isolated Kamakura house that her Leaf team along with the Taka had taken shelter in. It appeared to be the same except that there was no genjutsu hiding anything and no trapdoors, secret passageways and fireplace..._

_As promised by her loving brother a few days later a builder came over to their home and was willing to help with the reconstruction, being her brother's friend, he didn't carry the same prejudices of the Grass Village people. He showed them his plans and began building the trapdoors, and replaced the centuries old firepit with a more modern fireplace then added the secret passages leading to every corner and escape route of the house, including the underground room with a ladder and a trapdoor that Sakura knew would one day be hidden by Himiko's genjutsu. He even built a swing for little Himiko and painted it pink. Before leaving for good he left the two with an entire case of paperbombs for safety sake in case they were ever discovered. _

_Days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months, months to years as the memory sped up giving images of what happened during those times as Sakura finally saw how everything had come about..._

_Namiko and Himiko adjusted to their new life in isolation as Himiko read and reread a book her mother had brought with her called: 'Kunoichi on the Battlefield: A history of the female ninja' to try and tame whatever power her daughter had. Himiko practiced her body possession with passing strangers and even the body of a shinobi killed in one of shinobi wars buried nonchalantly a few miles from the back of the house. Sakura was grateful that during their stay they'd never stumbled upon the grave overgrown with tall grass. Watching her daughter inspired Namiko pull out one of her poetry books and wrote the poem 'Changes in the Wind'. _

_As time went on, they continued their lives in isolation even as it was perpetual fear, as every snapping branch, or unfamiliar sound sent them into a dizzying scare and a need to hide. Every now and again they would practice hiding in the house as well and making a point not to get caught. Namiko told her daughter that it was a game of 'hide and seek' to help her understand. _

_xxx_

_The memory began to slow down again... an invisible Sakura sat next to Namiko on the steps of the house as they both watched an innocent Himiko's years of practising the jutsu of the 'Kunoichi on the battlefield' book to the best of her abilities never having a proper teacher to oversee her training. Himiko slapped her hands together trying to master genjutsu but it was proving difficult without any proper master; at least she was having fun trying. _

_Then..._

_Himiko dropped the book and bent down to pick it up when she noticed a shadow by the forest. She hastily snatched the book up and gasped aloud frozen as her mother narrowed her eyes at the trees along with Sakura. A cold wind began to blow as Namiko also noticed the shadow of someone and stood up, yelling for her young girl to stay by her side as they held onto each other. Namiko stood where she was unknowing of what the intentions of the person were, friend or foe...until Himiko's shoulder began to burn profusely as the girl screamed her lungs out. Then it suddenly stopped; Namiko's head shot up and saw a hooded man step out of the woods and make his way to them while removing his hood. _

_Silvery white hair. Black round glasses and an overly smug grin on his sneaky face. _

_Namiko's eyes grew wide as she realised their location had been betrayed. Only the people of the Grass knew where they were hiding..._

_She hastily picked Himiko up and ran inside as Kabuto Yakushi strolled to the patio knowing in all his arrogance that he'd accomplish his mission to bring the little girl to his master. Namiko rushed as fast as she could packing all the necessities they would need and ran to the fireplace to try and grab one a hidden firebombs there but was too slow; Kabuto made it to the front door and was sliding the doorknob open. Namiko had no choice but to abandon the weapons and run to the trapdoor in the hallway with a frightened Himiko holding onto her back just as a noise of someone bursting in came. Namiko covered her daughter's mouth to prevent her from screaming, reassuring her that it was a game of hide and seek; just like they'd practised so many times to calm her down. But the opening of a hatch came...Namiko knew that he'd found their hiding place so they traveled even further into the secret passageway to try and get away from him. _

_Then Himiko used the very little genjutsu that she could use to open the hidden trapdoor so her and her mother could hide in the basement. Sakura wished she could see what Kabuto was doing as it sounded like he was retreating but she was confined to only what Himiko remembered. They waited in silence..._

_BOOM_

_A giant blast sounded above them as they both screamed involuntarily. Flames engulfed the entire house when the two ran back up the ladder as debris of the burning house threatened to fall on them. Sakura had a gut feeling that Kabuto had found some of the firebombs in the fireplace and set the house on fire to force them out of hiding. Namiko took a different path to a trapdoor leading to the outside and she and Himiko ran, never taking any breaks but ran far into Minamoto No Forest with Sakura in their wake. _

_xxx_

_They both only stopped running once they'd reached the Yoritomo Lake. Namiko breathed as she sat at the bottom of a tree and placed her daughter on her lap to calm and soothe her. She took out a book and wrote the poem 'Snake in the Grass' of her frustrations of the Grass Village people being so selfish in their acts of betrayal. _

_Namiko stood up along with Himiko and they walked towards the lake. It was merely a few hours away from the border of Fire country; if they were successful they could cross the border and the Leaf ANBU monitoring the border would detect them and would hopefully help them get away from their assailant. Himiko looked at her mother apprehensively as her mother smiled back gently and reassuringly. She turned around to pick up their belongings. _

_Her face collided with the metal of a Sound Village headband on someone's forehead. _

_Himiko screamed as Namiko tried to back away and yelled for her daughter to flee. The little girl stood frozen. She tried to possess Kabuto's body but he'd found a way to block her; no doubt a trick shown to him by his master. Kabuto seized her throat as she pleaded not for her own life but for the mercy of her daughter. Kabuto used his medical ninjutsu to block her chakra points and her body went limp. Himiko's scream froze in her throat at the sound of her mother's neck snapping and her limp body being thrown into the lake. Unable to move her limbs to swim up, Namiko sank until her head was submerged and reflected in her daughter's wide eyes eyes who she watched helplessly. Sakura couldn't help but yell out in frustration at the sight of Namiko's gruesome death in front of her daughter..._

_Himiko fell to her tiny shaken knees as tears glistened on her face, innocence stolen. Kabuto grabbed Himiko by the collar and threatened to do the same thing if she didn't cooperate and come with him. Kabuto retrieved the body and hid it underground._

_xxx_

_Himiko had no choice but to be tugged along back to the Grass Village. Once there Kabuto used the pretext of being a relative from the Sound Village to take Himiko as his own because her mother had drowned in Yoritomo Lake a day earlier. When the daimyo found out, he sent word out to the other Kamakura's about the girls' fate but they rejected her to come and stay with them as they saw her as an 'evil illegitimate non-Kamakura child'. Not even Namiko's kindhearted brother Fujiwara was able to take her in as he was killed by a bandit who tried to rob him as he left the village years ago. _

_Sakura watched sickened as Kabuto smiled his smug grin in victory like always: he had succeeded. Sakura could see it in Himiko's facial expression; her changing and hardening face as a female journalist working for the 'Kusa Chronicles' newspaper wrote the story of her mothers' drowning and took the photo of Himiko's that Sakura recognised as the one where Himiko had looked so embittered and enraged. Kabuto graciously asked to left out of the picture. Once the formalities were taken care of, Kabuto led the girl out of the village. _

_xxx_

_The Sound Village: A place for the damned._

_A hell for slaves of the evil snake which inhabited and controlled it. _

_As Kabuto dragged a terrified Himiko along the long winded tunnels of one of Orochimaru's hideouts, Sakura grew afraid of what Orochimaru might to do her and having to watch her torture._

_Himiko was given at least a moment's spare as she was thrown into a prison along with a dozen other deformed and wretched looking people. They frightened her in the way they stared at her as fresh meat come to join death. She cowered by the prison bars as Kabuto locked the gate and she slumped down and covered her face to cry. A little boy with blonde hair also in the same prison came up to her and introduced himself as Yukimaru. Himiko dismissed him in fear and hugged herself. _

_The clicking of a lock and chains made Himiko jump up in startle along with Sakura fearing that someone had finally come for the little girl. Instead a prisoner was being led back into the same cell as Himiko. He was shoved in aggressively while the guard locked the gate again. _

_Sakura had expected it to be Kariin but she remembered her saying that she'd never seen the little girl before but...Kariin had never mentioned which one of Orochimaru's hideout she'd worked in anyway. _

_The man appeared into the dim light of the prison and hovered above Himiko curled up on the floor crying. He sat down next to her and waited for Himiko's curiosity to kick in and look up at him._

_Her tear stained eyes looked up at a man smiling gently at her that made Sakura let out an unheard gasp of surprise. _

_A young man with long spikey dark brown hair and his own curse mark on his upper shoulder smiled a genuine smile at Himiko. Sakura stared at him: Hayashi Fukazawa: the would-be apparent 'pretender'. He didn't look in any way that Sakura remembered. He was definitely banged up of course but his skin was a normal colour and he wasn't evil looking nor did he have the bandage wrapped on his upper neck. _

_Hayashi pulled something out of his pocket and held it out to Himiko. It was a Barbie doll with long blonde hair and brown eyes. Himiko's eyes jumped back and forth from him to the doll for a long time before she reached her hand out to take the doll. _

_And smiled at him back. _

_Hayashi told her that the doll had once belonged to his own daughter who had been a toddler and that she'd reminded him of the daughter he'd once had back home wherever that was. It was touching for Sakura to see them both as she finally understood the bond the two shared in the hellhole and Himiko finally having someone to lookout for her. _

_Then Kabuto came back again. _

_He grabbed her arm and dragged her kicking and screaming out of the cell while Hayashi pleaded for Kabuto to take him instead but he didn't ever look back. _

_Himiko was taken into a dark room where hardly any light was visible. Sakura braced her soul for the worst, having to witness whatever Orochimaru did to people...__Kabuto exchanged smiles with his master as Himiko stared at the' demon snake' stood up from his chair and walked up to her. __Himiko fell to the ground and looked down as fear overwhelmed her trembling body. Sakura felt close to tears at having to watch her alone and unknowing was would become of her._

_Orochimaru let out a chuckle and told her not to be afraid as he picked her up by the arm and took her into his lab and placed her on an operating table between two unconscious people lying beside her on their own tables. _

_Then Orochimaru did some unknown jutsu with his hands and grabbed Himiko's neck who screamed and screamed her lungs out. Orochimaru didn't flinch as an orange chakra glowed in the dark room. He repeated the jutsu as many times as the orange chakra grew stronger and brighter, he appeared to try and extract it... _

_Sakura closed her eyes..._

_After what felt like forever, Orochimaru stopped and called Kabuto out to take her back while he wrote down some of his intriguing findings that excited him. He stated that he would resume his research with her later..._

_Himiko was near unconscious as she was taken back to her prison. Hayashi then placed her on the floor for her to rest before shooting a scathing look back at Kabuto locking them up again. _

_Once Kabuto was out of sight, Hayashi walked over to another prisoner who'd been chipping away at the bars of the window for months for a chance to escape and nodded at him. The other prisoner told him that it was ready and walked over to the window of the cell, pulling off four of the bars. It was just enough of a space to squeeze out. Sakura smiled when she saw the escape route as Hayashi took Himiko and placed her over his back to squeeze himself out then began to run. _

_As Sakura was about to leave with the escapees, she noticed that a few of them had decided to remain behind, namely the tiny boy Kukimaru who she'd see again one day..._

_The alarm only sounded once they'd already made their glorious escape._

_As Hayashi ran, he asked Himiko where she'd come from and she'd responded with the house where she'd been living with her mother so both Hayashi and Himiko headed out back to Minamoto No Forest..._

_xxx_

_The scene changed and Sakura saw that they were back at the isolated house burned by Kabuto. Once there Hayashi became somewhat of a father figure for the orphaned Himiko. _

_Hayashi began cleaning up the place again; he fixed the floorboards and some of the rooms in the corridor of the seven bedrooms that Himiko would later hide with her genjutsu and helped her perfect her genjutsu, taijutsu and ninjutsu, also her special body possesion jutsu once he learned of it. In a few weeks Himiko had become unstoppable in her training, even perfecting the skill used by kunoichi centures ago to increase her speed thanks to the 'Kunoichi on the battlefield' book that had survived the fire._

_Later, he helped her make a pact agreement and contract using her blood and a long scroll with a beast that she could summon anytime she wanted. As Himiko's blood touched the scroll and did a summoning for the first time, a giant oni beast appeared roaring with a flaming tail and eyes. She looked pleased at its massive size, perfect for protecting them. Eventually Hayashi helped Himiko retrieve her mother's body from being buried earlier by Kabuto and placed it on a table in the underground room where she hid the trapdoor leading to it with a genjustu. _

_But their glorious days in training were almost at an end when a chance encounter further destroyed Himiko's already fragmented world further..._

_xxx_

_A furious venomous and fed up Orochimaru arrived at the house unexpectedly one day...Himiko was sweeping soot out onto the patio when her curse mark began burning...she knew what it meant immediately and screamed for Hayashi inside._

_Hayashi burst out of the front door of the Kamakura house and saw the demon snake. He yelled for Himiko to use her fast speed to get away while he fought back._

_Orohcimaru didn't have the patience for this fight as he'd stumbled up on their property by accident; it appeared as he was just as surprised to see them as well. Sakura gasped as she saw the direction where Orochimaru had come from: Tenchi Bridge. She wondered if it was the same time that her, Naruto, Yamato and Sai had also been discovered hiding in the same forest by Orochimaru...it was mindblowing..._

_Orochimaru regurgitated a giant sword out his mouth and used it to stabbed Hayashi through the gut, spilling out all his insides in a gruesome and furious attack. But it gave Himiko a chance to get away. _

_ Himiko watched from the forest of another parental figure being ripped from her life once again... this time it was by a sword through the gut instead of water...she remained in the trees for several days. __As days went by, her heart grew ever hardened by the murder of her mother and Hayashi by the people who'd betrayed her. _

_Alone, angry and afraid, s__he devised a plan of revenge for the people of the Grass with her hating heart, using her favourite game she'd played with her mother. It was only fair that the betrayers got a taste of their own medicine in the way that Namiko and Hayashi had died. She then placed a massive genjutsu over the whole forest to manipulate and use whatever resources she wanted. It spanned out like a tangled spidersweb, hiding all nature and giving the forest its eerie ambience. _

_She decided to use Hayashi's body since people of the Grass would recognise her own real one, and thought of the idea of being a gardener in order to be allo__wed into the village for work._

_xxx_

_The reaping began on a cool summers' day in the Grass..._

_Sakura watched horrified as Himiko possessed Hayashi's body and went with him into town to do his job as a gardener but he stopped at a butchery; a slaughterhouse would be perfect irony of a place for her to try out her sadistic plans. _

_Himiko in Hayashi's body walked up to the butcher and took the thick butchers knife out of his hands; the instructed him to hide away and make sure that he is not found. The butcher, thinking he was a robber, did as he was told and hid away which in turn unknowingly trapped himself in Himiko's genjutsu... she continued to look for him until she found him behind the door of the pantry. Then she possessed the butcher's body leaving Hayashi's body nearby against the wall and walked back into the butchery store while breaking the genjutsu. _

_The butcher's wife walked out as a few customers waited in line for their orders. Himiko make the butcher walk slowly up to everyone eyeing him and pierced his belly with his sharp knife as they all watched in horror. Then she slid the butcher's knife across his stomach. Blood amongst his insides spilled out, the man's body collapsed as his wife screamed falling to her knees and the customers ran out for their lives. As the woman screamed she saw a man with dark long spikey hair walk out casually..._

_It happened again and again over and over again in the Grass Village...Everytime Himiko pretended to be someone long enough to have them kill themselves in front of ther loved ones; she carried their bodies back to Minamoto Forest for future usage then hid their bodies in the tangled spiderweb of her choking genjutsu surrounding the area. _

_Sakura was shocked at how Himiko's reign of terror was relentless for such a little girl; she targeted anyone and everyone she saw. Ordinary people walking down the street she'd walk up to them as Hayashi and tell them to start hiding. Then once they were trapped in her genjutsu and were found she possessed their bodies and threw them down wells, waterways, pools and any body of water to drown just like her mother. Or if they had a knife near them-disembowelment like her father figure. _

_The recent spikes in what appeared to be suicide followed by a mysterious looking man wearing brown working overalls and dark brown hair prompted the daimyo of the Grass to ask for assistance from the nearby well equipped Leaf Village while Himiko saw the dispatch, she as Hayashi retreated back into the forest. __  
_

_xxx_

_Himiko was herself when she heard people in the forest. Firstly she saw teenagers, one with blue-black hair who was being followed by a girl with cherry red hair, a skinny boy with a shark tooth who was complaining and a big guy with orange hair. They were all wearing strange cloaks with weird clouds on them. As if it wasn't enough another group had arrived and were heading for a collision with the other group. She shook her head in overwhelming fury, Sakura could feel in her memory that she was under the impression that the Taka and Leaf teams or 'betrayers' were looking for her to take her to Orochimaru. But she felt like playing a game with them. Her favourite game. _

_Sakura stared at herself and the rest of the Leaf team arriving to the forest early afternoon and were heading straight for the Taka. Himiko was right above them in the trees. She saw them start to argue when the Leaf team and Taka collided, especially when Naruto was freaking out at suddenly running into Sasuke and Himiko grew annoyed then grabbed a fistful of paperbombs and lit them all at once... throwing them right in the middle of the group of people which sent them all flying and knocked them out in a blast. _

_Sakura saw Himiko jump down and touch Ino's beautiful hair then took over her body but Himiko immediatley knew that something wasn't right. She was unable to read Ino's thoughts and tap into her mind...like her mind was protected by a hereditary mind jutsu. This angered her as her eyes rolled back into her head and she stabbed a kunai into Neji Hyuuga's head... ]but saw that the pink haired kunoichi was stirring so she possessed her body just as the dark haired Leaf shinobi woke up. She placed a genjutsu on him so he wouldn't feel the giant blade etching him closer to his death in his skull. _

_It was bizarre for Sakura to see her body being taken over by someone else. It made her feel strangely self-conscious. _

_Himiko read Sakura's mind, the shinobi was called Neji and he was of the Hyuuga clan of the Leaf. He walked up to her as he greeted her then she walked over to him and gave him a hug which puzzled him; she was unable to resist when she saw the blade in his head. Then she asked him the magic question: whether he wanted to play a game of 'hide and seek' but he refused as she took his hand and they walked around. Himiko could feel the blonde girl stirring again, so she ran away and hid herself in the genjutsu telling the Leaf shinobi that she needed the 'loo'._

_None of the Leaf shinobi knew that they were only a few metres away from each other but were being hidden by the genjutsu of the forest and so were many dead bodies. She abandoned the body of the pink haired kunoichi at the base of a snow laden tree and decided to scare the 'Sakura' girl by screaming and whispering in her genjutsu 'hide and seek' hide and seek'...after her amusement at her fear and bloodied nose, she went over to posses the blonde kunoichi. _

_Himiko as Ino watched amused as the pink haired shinobi searched around relentlessly for her friends only a few metres from her until she saw a house; Sakura's mind was numb at seeing the truth of what had happened to them all. _

_Himiko as Ino though it was a good time to call out and so the pink haired Kunoichi came and found her but once again the thoughts of the blonde kunoichi were unavailable. She was unable to read the blonde shinobi's mind. She remembered that the pink haired girl's name was 'Sakura' having possessed her body previously. After a few attempts she was also able to learn that her name was Ino and she was afraid that someone called 'Sasuke' would reach someone called 'Naruto'. _

_The pink haired shinobi enquired about her bloodied hand which had been used to stab Neji Hyuuga but Himiko as Ino couldn't make anything up or further read the blonde's mind so she attacked the girl called Sakura. Just as the strong Sakura girl she was about to deliver the final blow she transferred her chakra to a dead body underground to protect it. _

_Once the majority of the Leaf shinobi had found each other along with the Taka, Himiko decided to summon her giant oni beast as small as she could get it, she pulled off her summoning jutsu near a shinobi who'd been injured by her shuriken shower when she was the girl Ino. He had spikey brown hair that reminded her of Hayashi..._

_She watched in amazement as the giant oni grew and the Leaf shinobi with the spikey brown hair scramble away with everyone else heading towards the genjutsu house, just like she'd wanted... Sakura stood in Himiko's memory watching the truth unfold._

_As she walked through the forest, trying to get away from the impending storm, she ran into the last boy with yellow hair as he woke up. She asked him whether he wanted to play a game of hide and seek but once again she was rejected so she__ did her body possesion jutsu._

_ Himiko found herself in a __damp corridor...she was shaking as she noticed that even though she was hiding, she had somehow been felt by something terrifying. She had seen it as she moved past a giant cage and screamed a piercing scream in fright._

_The boy had some scary creature inside him but as long as she remained hidden, nothing would happen. Then she placed the body atop the stairs and thought of a story to tell. She decided to tell the people inside that she had been blown forward by a gust of wind and had been knocked out for hours. The 'Naruto' and 'jinchuriki' boy was whiny and loud-mouthed as described by the girl Sakura when she'd read her thoughts, but he was cared about by all. _

_Himiko Kamakura as Naruto Uzumaki banged on the front door of the isolated house in Minamoto No Forest whining to be let in: It was playtime..._

**5:00 pm**

"_Sakura...Sakura! Can you hear me?..."_

A distant voice called out as the world spun in a dizzying blur when Sakura felt herself being pulled back into her own mind...she stirred and opened her eyes to feel her hand burning as it was still touching Himiko's head and fiery chakra.

She was still tied up onto a beam of the destroyed flaming house along with Naruto and Sasuke a short distance away.

She let go of the young girl's head as they both came back into consciousness.

The dark haired girl breathed hard and narrowed her eyes which made blood seep from her nostrils as she flared them in a ferocious anger. She stood up shaking and picked Suigetsu's blade up...Sakura stared into her dark merciless wide eyes as she was about to swing the blade...

"Wait, please Himiko, listen to me," Sakura pleaded but the young girl's livid face was unrelenting in all her fury. She clutched the hilt tightly and...

"He'd dead! Orochimaru's dead!" she yelled as the sharp blade stopped just before her temple. She held her breath along with Naruto who froze with her.

"Dead?"

"Yes...you don't have to be afraid of him anymore or anyone wanting to hurt you. See that boy over there with the dark blue hair?" she breathed gesturing to Sasuke with her head, "He killed Orochimaru. Orochimaru is dead"

Himiko turned around slightly to look at Sasuke's daring glare...

"Please you don't have to live in anger and fear anymore. I want to help you. Let us take you back to the Leaf..."

"Sakura! Have you lost your mind? Think about what you're saying, we can't take her back to the Leaf" yelled Naruto outraged from where he was.

"Yes we can. She deserves it. Himiko, everything you and your mother went through was because of the people of the Grass Village. Come back with us to Konoha, we'll take care of you, get you proper training and give you a home and friends that will give you a proper motivation to fight for."

She surveyed Sakura through doubtful eyes. Naruto looked at Sakura open mouthed, but he didn't understand; seeing Namiko and Himiko's plight in memories made Sakura feel that she owed it to Namiko to protect her daughter...

"Himiko I promise, we won't hurt you. I just want to help you, let your mother's legacy live on" whispered Sakura.

Himiko froze for what felt like forever staring silently at Sakura's eyes, trying to spot a bluff, but she appeared to be sincere. The little girl took a long breath and closed her eyes.

The fire encircling the house vanished.

The forest hummed a quiet silence full of birds and wildlife.

Sakura, Naruto and Sasuke were released from their tightly bound rope.

The sunset of the first day was visible through the forest as birds began to chirp and dead bodies along with everything that had been hidden by a genjutsu appeared.

In the forest...Neji Hyuuga opened his eyes and got up steadily. Underneath the house Shikamaru and Tenten rubbed their stiff neck and woke up, Shikamaru wiped his bleeding nose. Kariin, Suigetsu, Jugo and Ino stood up from the snow covered ground outside the house where they'd been hidden. Sakura smiled gratefully and nodded in approval at Himiko when everyone made their way slowly and disorientatedly, back towards the house. She extended a hand to Himiko who gently smiled back at her...but her smile froze and Sakura noticed imediately.

The little girl's smile vanished as quickly as it had come.

Himiko's eyes grew wide as a charging light illuminated around and behind her.

Sakura saw her frozen face and looked down at her abdomen as a sharp blade pierced through Himiko's belly along with a bright blue electric charge of the chidori as blood splattered onto Sakura's frozen face.

A drip of blood fell from Himiko's mouth and nose as her body fell forward into Sakura's arms.

"I can't allow the Leaf Village to have such a powerful weapon in its arsenal. I'm still chasing _my_ revenge!" spat Sasuke.

Sakura stared blankly into his vicious black eyes as she held onto Himiko's body and he retracted his sword.

"Let's move!" he yelled to the Taka. The four of them sped away along with their team leader.

"Naruto! He's getting away!" Sakura screamed with all her might unable to move out of shock.

Naruto looked towards the trees and saw his best friend fleeing once again.

"Sasuke! Get back here!" he screamed giving chase. His fingernails began to grow again as he jumped into the dense forest and from branch to branch. Kariin had a difficult time keeping up. Naruto was able to grab a hold of her Akatsuki cloak.

She let out a yelp as Naruto yanked the hem of her black cloak, pulling them both falling down to crash onto the soft thawing snow on the forest floor.

Jugo jumped down into a thunderous crash to grab her and continue running while he swung his arm at Naruto getting up who flew a few metres away at theimpact of the punch. Naruto tried as fast as he could to bounce back but all he could do was watched the hem of the black cloaks vanishing from sight...

"SASUKE!" he screamed after him in an echo. Naruto punched the nearby tree in frustration and walked back dejectedly back to the rest of the ninja...

"I...I failed" Sakura whispered allowing her head to sink as she placed Himiko's body on the floor.

"No we did what we had to do. Our mission was to assassinate the rogue ninja and here we are." came Shikamaru still reeling from his ordeal.

"That's not what I mean Shikamaru; Namiko...I wanted to protect her child, there was no rogue ninja, just a confused child looking for justice and revenge," she said to which Naruto arriving touched her shoulder, "Sounds familiar".

"C'mon, we have to report this to the daimyo of the Grass so they can send people to remove these bodies back to the Grass Village for proper burial and we can head back home." said Neji balancing his shaky body against Tenten supporting him.

Ino looked up at Shikamaru wanting more than anything to give him a hugof relief but whatever had happened between them had to be over.

Sakura walked back into the underground basement of the house to place Himiko's body next to her mother's one and walked back out to the rest of the Leaf shinobi finally grateful that they were leaving...

Sakura looked over her shoulder at the house once again with one final sinking feeling...

"At least the people of the Grass can rest easy knowing the suicide 'hide and seek' serial killer of water and disembowelment is over" came Tenten.

xxx

Several months later...

The long Grasses of the spring returned to the isolated house when a team of morticians arrived at the house to retrieve the final few bodies of people killed by Himiko: 'the pretender' as the village had been so shocked to find out.

One man who discovered a few of the remaining bodies near the house prepared to lift a body into a body bag...

When he fell to the floor squirming and trembling with his body contorting in a freakish manner and his eyes rolling back into his head...

_Luckily for her they had forgotten that she couldn't be killed for as long as she had a body, dead or alive to possess.._._she knew better than to trust anyone..._

"Hey, Takanori are you okay there?" called someone approaching the fallen man.

"Oh yeah I'm fine but I'm getting kinda tired of doing all this work you know," the man called Takanori whined as his colleagues helped him up.

"You're tired of working here, then what do you want to do?" asked the man put off by the laziness as he walked away.

"Oh I don't know...maybe play a game of... 'hide and seek..." he said.

A menacing smile broke across Takanori 'the pretenders' face as the once eerie forest once again became far too quiet to be considered normal and natural...

**-The end!-**

**-Thank you everyone, until next time. Holla bekke! If you still have some unanswered questions don't hesitate to ask-**

**Disclaimer: 'Naruto' by Masashi Kishimoto-sensei. **


End file.
